
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 


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T’vTa'Ekv- 


TJNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 






























SUGGESTION 

















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SUGGESTION 



MABEL COLLINS 

AUTHOR OF 





“THE CONFESSIONS OF A WOMAN,” “THE BLOSSOM AND THE FRUIT,*’ 
“LORD VANECOURT’S DAUGHTER,” ETC. 


.- -ApN CF C.'/iv ;.- 

'T 

SEP 10 1392 

2 i w 92, 1 X 


MU 

) 


NfiW YORK 

LOVELL, GESTEFELD & COMPANY 

125 East 23D Street 







K, 




Copyright, 1892, 

BY 

UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY 


[All rights reserved] 




SUGGESTION. 


Extract from Miss Margery Hawthorne’s 
Diary. 

“ The last entry made in this dear little book is 
the record of my engagement to Rex. How happy 
I was that night ! I felt I must write down all 
about it before I went to bed. I wonder whether I 
am really the lovable creature Rex thinks I am, or 
whether it’s his fancy ? How can I ever know ! 
It doesn’t matter, so long as he fancies it, for that 
is enough for me. How I love him ! It makes 
my heart stop beating and then jump on again only 
to think of him. I didn’t know it was possible to 
love anybody so much. And what a dear good 
fellow he is ! He says such lovely things — I 
couldn’t write them down here, it would make me 
feel hot, but it is so delightful to remember them 
— things that make me feel as if I were the only 


6 


SUGGESTION. 


woman in all the world worth looking at, and cer- 
tainly the very sweetest that ever lived. He can’t 
mean it all of course, that’s impossible, because I 
know I’m not. It’s just his way. But oh ! I do 
hope he means some of all he says, for it makes me 
feel so proud and happy to fancy anyone can think 
of me like that. 

“ However, I didn’t sit down to-night to write 
about Rex, though it’s very hard to write or even 
think about anything or anybody else. But this 
little locked book of mine is a real diary — what I 
call a diary that is — not a record of every-day 
doings but of special-day doings. When any 
extraordinary event happens to me, I like to 
write down all about it here before I forget 
what it felt like. I wish it was something about 
Rex I had to write down to-night, but there’s no 
such luck, for he wasn’t here this evening. All 
I have to record is an odd new experience which I 
don’t want to forget. 

“ W e had two or three intimate friends here at 
dinner ; one was Oliver Heriot. He’s oddly like 
Rex sometimes, and yet so different ! I can’t 


SUGGESTION. 


7 


say I like him, though I have seen so much 
more of him than of his brother, Rex having been 
in America so long. But Oliver seems to me lazy 
and selfish, while Rex is the most unselfish fellow 
that ever lived. Of course I may be wrong, but 
that’s how I feel. Alidin this little book, when I 
do take the trouble to write in it, I may as well 
tell the truth. 

“We got up a game of willing and wishing in 
the drawing-room after dinner, as somebody had 
been reading an article in one of the magazines 
about hypnotism, and we all began wondering 
whether there was anything in it or whether it was 
all nonsense. Of course papa laughed at us and said 
it was all nonsense certainly ; and of course he was 
longing to try it on me and see if he could get the 
best of me. So after dinner we began like silly 
creatures. Papa wouldn’t rest satisfied unless I 
was the first one sent out of the room and be the 
first one to see if he could make me do what he 
wanted when I came back. But of course he 
couldn’t, though he walked me about with his hands 
on my shoulders for ever so long, and everybody 


8 


SUGGESTION. 


sat round and laughed at us. I didn’t feel any- 
thing at all. Papa got quite cross and said I was 
no good; so somebody else was sent out. But 
there was no success with anybody till I went out 
again and Oliver Heriot tried with me. 

“ When I went into the room I felt quite cer- 
tain he could not do anything with me, and that 
the whole thing was nonsense. Then he came 
and put his hands on my shoulders ; after a min- 
ute he took them away, and coming in front of me 
stood and stared in my eyes. And then without 
knowing I did it — and that’s what annoys me so ! 
— I did the most foolish thing, a thing I never 
supposed anybody could have made me do. Right 
before all those people I went up to Rex’s photo- 
graph, and actually fell on my knees before it and 
then kissed it. Could anything be more utterly 
foolish ? I don’t wonder everyone laughed at me ! 
It makes me furious to think of it ! 

“ But how is it I didn’t know I had done it till 
I had done it? That’s what puzzles me so — I 
don’t want to forget that. If I try any more ex- 
periments I’ll write down all about them as they 


SUGGESTION. 


9 


happen. For it’s very strange to do a thing like 
that without being even aware of the least thought 
in one’s mind about doing it. 

“I was furious with Oliver for making me do 
such a silly thing. Still, it was Rex’s portrait and 
nobody else’s ! — that’s one comfort.” 


10 


SUGGESTION. 


CHAPTER I. 

Two young men were sitting smoking over a 
bright fire blazing in a harness-room. This room 
was as cheerful, as warm and as pleasant as any in 
the mansion known as Heriot Hall, to which the 
stables belonged ; and with these two young men 
it had always been a favorite lounge. But on 
this occasion there was a certain feeling of awk- 
wardness which had never existed before. This 
arose from the fact that hitherto these brothers, 
the two young Heriots, had been equally free of 
their father’s house ; but now Rex Heriot came 
out from the billiard-room, while Oliver entered 
the stable-yard from the drive. And both knew 
that Oliver could not go into the house ; further- 
more that his father would be infuriated if he were 
found to be in the stables. Yet his favorite mare 
stood there in her stall ; and the two hunters he 
had ridden last winter. His rooms in the house 


SUGGESTION. 


11 


were still littered with his especial belongings, his 
guns were on their accustomed racks ; his setter 
lay basking in the heat of the fire. But Oliver 
himself was an outsider. 

He had come home from Paris a week ago, and 
after dinner on the first evening of his arrival, had 
an interview with his father which ended in his 
leaving the house again the same night and going 
to sleep at the village inn. By which means it 
immediately became known to all the neighbors 
and the whole country side, before noon the next 
day, that “ Old Heriot ” and his son Oliver had 
quarrelled. 

Rex was treated to his father’s view on the 
matter, in full, and in instalments, which made it 
more irritating if possible than the punishment 
would have been otherwise. As he strolled into 
the harness-room, Oliver, who was there first, 
thought he had never seen the handsome face 
so tired and worn-looking. 

These two brothers in some respects were as 
much alike as if they were twins. When one met 
them walking in the road side by side, or watched 


12 


SUGGESTION. 


them enter a drawing room together, the likeness 
between them was quite remarkable, although 
Oliver was two or three years older than Rex. 
Their movements and gestures were very much 
alike ; both tall, broad-shouldered, well-built men, 
with fine features, bright hair, blonde moustaches 
and keen gray-blue eyes. In appearance they 
almost reproduced each other ; in character, those 
who knew them well, thought them complements. 

“ You look bored, old man,” said Oliver. “ I 
suppose the governor’s been going on at you 
all the time ? ” 

u Yes ; ” said Rex, and paused; then added 
with emphasis, “ without intermission.” 

“ I’m sorry for you,” said Oliver in a tone of 
sympathy ; then with a dark look on his face, 
“ you pay pretty dear for your post of favorite.” 

It was said with a sneer ; and an onlooker 
would have expected Reginald to retaliate. But 
he made no answer. He leaned against the mantel- 
piece and took a cigar out of his case, with a 
languid air of a man who was too used to his 
companion to take any notice of him. 


SUGGESTION. 


13 


Rex had inherited his mother’s temperament ; 
gentle, cheerful, good-humored. His father’s 
irascibility and Oliver’s peculiar temper, simply 
wore him out, perplexed and worried him, so that 
he allowed them to say all the disagreeable things 
and answer themselves. This quiescent attitude 
irritated Oliver beyond everything ; for by it Rex 
had become master of the situation. Always his 
father’s favorite, long since his right hand in 
business matters, Rex was now his father’s 
heir. 

Since his stormy interview of a week ago with 
Oliver, Mr. Heriot had made a will leaving all his 
enormous possessions absolutely to Rex. His 
lawyer had come down from London on purpose 
to draw up this document, which he had carried back 
and had deposited safely in the Heriot strong-box. 

“Now, thank Heaven,” piously ejaculated old 
Heriot about a dozen times a day, “ my money 
won’t be gambled away over the card-table, spent 
in pot-houses, and flung in the gutter. Mark my 
words, cutting off that young blackleg with a 
shilling is no loss to him ; for if he were as rich 


14 


SUGGESTION. 


as the Duke of Westminster he’d be down to the 
shilling all the same in a year or two.” 

The fortunes and positions of these two young 
men, were, it will be seen, considerably changed 
since they had last lounged away the afternoon in 
the harness-room talking of the dogs and horses. 
Little else had they in common to talk of, for they 
had not the same tastes. But they had always 
been good friends, having that idle, indifferent 
sort of almost physical affection for each other 
which healthy, happy young people who have 
lived much together generally acquire. Oliver 
was an excellent story-teller, and knew how to 
adapt himself to his audience ; many a merry hour 
they had spent in this room, laughing over his anec- 
dotes. 

To-day there was a constraint and a gloom which 
had never existed between them before. And 
their faces almost lost all likeness from dissimi- 
larity of expression. Rex, who, by sheer inoffen- 
siveness of character, had walked into the most 
desirable position possible, looked like a victim. 
Oliver, the outcast, had an air of resolution about 


SUGGESTION. 


15 


him which became him well. The dark shade that 
crossed his face sometimes and the smouldering 
fire in his eyes, Rex simply put down to temper — 
that Heriot temper that he was so tired of ! 

“ Well,” said Oliver after a moment’s silence, 
“ the old man has got somebody to abuse now to 
his heart’s content so long as he lives, I suppose. 
That ought to make him happy. Hang it all, if I 
can see the difference between the way he’s made 
money and the way I’ve lost it ; we’re both gam- 
blers ; only he is successful and I’m not.” 

“ Quite a sufficient distinction for him,” observed 
Rex. 

“And for me too,” said Oliver bitterly. “ Well, 
you’ve got all the luck now.” 

“ And you’ve had it,” said Rex, quietly, but 
quickly. 

“ True,” agreed Oliver. For he had been his 
mother’s favorite. Mr. Heriot in his earlier will, 
had, he thought, favored Rex too much in some 
respects, though practically he had divided his pos- 
sessions pretty fairly between his two sons. But he 
had long been aware of the difference in character 


16 


SUGGESTION. 


between them, and consequently had not left 
Oliver much ready money. Mrs. Heriot had a 
fortune of her own and showed her partiality — as 
she thought, her justice, — by leaving it to Oliver. 
She had died about a year since ; that year had 
been cheerfully occupied by Oliver in making away 
with the fortune in question. 

“ Quite true,” he repeated ; “ but at all events, 
I’ve done you an uncommonly good turn. You 
can’t deny that.” 

“ That’s as we look at it,” said Rex. “ I’d a great 
deal rather, for my part, that you would make it 
up with the old man. Life isn’t worth living as 
things are at present.” 

“ Make it up with the old man ! ” echoed 
Oliver. u My dear boy, how’s it to be done ? ” 

“ I’m sure I don’t know,” said Rex wearily, “ un- 
less you like to turn over a new leaf. But, of 
course, even so, he wouldn’t believe in you.” 

“ Not he ! ” said Oliver. 

“ What I mean is, no gain to me can compen- 
sate for all the row. I can’t stand living at home 
as things are. I think I shall get him to send me 


SUGGESTION. 


17 


out to California again. I’d rather be by myself 
out there, than in such a pandemonium as you two 
manage to create.” 

“ Really ? ” said Oliver, with an air of innocent 
inquiry, 44 and what about Margery Hawthorn ? ” 
44 Well, what about her ? ” demanded Rex, turn- 
ing round on him, and taking his cigar from his 
mouth. 

44 Will she like it ? ” 

44 Is that anything to you ? ” 

44 Dear me, no ; only a general interest in the 
subject. By the way, that brings me round to 
the very question I wanted to see you about. I 
dined at Hawthorndene last night, and Sir Charles 
made me an offer. You needn’t look so amazed; 
though I don’t wonder. However, this is the 
whole of it. He had heard, like everyone else, of 
all the row here. He asked me if it was true what 
was said, that I was over head and ears in debt 
and hadn’t a halfpenny left. I owned up it was 
true. Well, he asked me if I’d like to go and be 
his steward pro tem , till something else turns up. 
It’s uncommonly kind of the old fellow ; but he 


18 


SUGGESTION. 


always liked me. It’ll be turning over a new 
leaf with a vengeance, it seems to me, if I do all 
his dirty work for him. But I don’t quite see 
what else to do, for I literally haven’t the money 
now to pay for my bed at the inn. And it would 
suit me awfully well to lie quiet for a bit.” 

Rex had looked keenly at his brother from time 
to time during this speech ; but he made no reply 
when it was over. He stood against the mantel- 
shelf, quietly smoking. Presently Oliver looked 
up. 

“ Well, what do you think, Rex ? ” 

“ Why, take it, of course.” 

Oliver rose and stretched himself. After a mo- 
ment he spoke again. 

“ I wanted to act fair and square, old man ; 
that’s why I came in to speak to you about it. 
As far as I’m concerned of course I’ve no choice, 
being penniless. Sir Charles makes it comfortable 
for me ; he is going to shut up the steward’s house, 
or let it ; and I am to live at Hawthorndene. I 
suppose you’ve no objection ? ” 

“ I ! ” exclaimed Rex. 


SUGGESTION. 


19 


Oliver laughed. “ That’s all right,” he said. 
“ But you must remember I am myself an admirer 
of Miss Margery Hawthorn’s, and have been your 
rival. I did not know if you would care for me 
to live in the same house with her.” 

“ You are not my rival now,” said Rex quietly. 
“ What objection could I possibly have ? You and 
Margery are very good friends ? ” 

The inherent nobility of the man came out as he 
said this; and never had the difference between 
the brothers been so apparent as at this moment. 

“ Of course we are,” said Oliver easily. “ That’s 
all right, and I’ll settle it at once. It’s a queer 
position, to go into harness next door, as it were.” 

“ I wonder what the old man will think of it,” 
said Rex. “ If you stick to it, it may reconcile 
him in time.” 

Oliver made no answer. At that moment old 
Mr. Heriot’s loud voice was heard in the stable- 
yard. Rex immediately went out to him ; anything 
to prevent his meeting Oliver and making the air 
black by another scene. 

Oliver waited, listening ; he heard their voices 


20 


SUGGESTION. 


growing fainter ; then he went to the window and 
looked after them. When they had vanished he 
turned round to the fire with a laugh. 

“ Oh, my brother ! ” he said aloud, “ what a fool 
you are ! ” 


SUGGESTION. 


21 


CHAPTER II. 

Margery Hawthorn was sitting, ready dressed 
for dinner, by the drawing-room fire that same 
evening. She had ensconced herself in a low 
rocking-chair, her favorite seat. She was a rest- 
less creature, unable to keep herself still for a 
moment together ; and the rocking-chair made a 
sort of excuse for the continual vibration of her 
whole frame. Margery was a great favorite, and 
attracted everyone to her; there was something 
in this constant activity of hers which was fas- 
cinating in itself. It was impossible to take your 
eyes off her ; the delicately pretty hands, with their 
birdlike flutter, were a sufficient study in them- 
selves to an observant person. 

She was a true brunette, her hair and eyes both 
of the intense blue-black one sees in the sky on 
moonless nights ; her face a pointed oval, dimpled 


22 


SUGGESTION. 


with laughter, flashing with the keen intelligence of 
the black eyes, fresh and beautiful with the clear- 
ness of the olive skin. An eager, clever, brilliant, 
delightful young woman ; with all kinds of burning 
possibilities and potentialities not yet evolved. 

As she sat here alone, swinging herself back- 
wards and forwards, and tapping one foot impa- 
tiently on the ground, she whistled a little now 
and again — just a bar of melody — and the whistle 
was very soft and rich and pleasant. But it only 
came with a more violent impulsion of the chair, 
and seemed to betoken a passing crisis of restless- 
ness or irritation of thought. 

Through the door, which stood open, presently 
entered, almost without sound, a lounging, hand- 
some figure. It was that of Oliver Heriot. 

“ There’s something ominous, to me, in the sound 
of that whistle,” he observed, in a low voice. 
“ I’ve noticed before that dire events follow the 
exhibition of that accomplishment of yours, Miss 
Margery. Pray, what has gone wrong ? ” 

Margery laughed ; a bright, infectious laugh. 

“ Why, what should have gone wrong ? ” she 


SUGGESTION. 


23 


said. “ You are absurd. But then you always are.*’ 
She turned away and took up an open book that 
lay on a table beside her. Oliver very contentedly 
sat down on a couch close by, and appeared to fall 
into a profound reverie. Suddenly Margery threw 
down her book and faced round on him. 

44 You are trying to make me think of some- 
thing,” she exclaimed. “ I can feel you are ! Oh, 
do leave this horrid hypnotizing alone. I wish all 
those ridiculous Psychic Research people were at 
the bottom of the sea ! ” 

Margery was an impetuous young woman, as 
may be seen. She got up from her chair and be- 
gan to walk restlessly up and down the room. 

44 It was Mrs. Carruthers who annoyed me,” she 
said suddenly ; 44 that new American woman who 
has come to live at the old Hall. I called on her 
this afternoon. She is awfully pretty — the pret- 
tiest girl I have seen in my life. Now, I didn’t 
mean to say anything about her ! ” she exclaimed 
in a different tone, stopping suddenly in her prom- 
enade. 44 Oliver Heriot, tell me the truth, have 
you been making me tell you ? ” 


24 


SUGGESTION. 


“ I wanted to know what put you out,” answered 
Oliver languidly from his sofa. 

“ Oh, you wretch ! This willing and wishing 
is all very well as a game, but it’s simply hateful 
to have you go on like this at all sorts of times ; 
leave it alone, Oliver ! It worries me. I had de- 
termined not to say anything about Mrs. Car- 
ruthers, and then I go and say just what I didn’t 
mean to say without even knowing I have said 
it till afterwards ! Why, it’s maddening ! Go 
away, and leave me alone. You won’t, of course 
— well, I’ll go. Why doesn’t papa come! It’s 
just dinner time. She is perfectly lovely, white- 
skinned, making one think of a lily, with masses 
of chestnut hair and extraordina^ great eyes that 
seem to me to be red rather than brown, they are 
so rich. And such little tapering hands. They 
look so wicked ! But she looks as innocent as a 
baby. Anybody must love her, she’s so pretty. 
I’m certain she has met Rex somewhere, she is 
very white, but she seemed to grow whiter when 
she heard his name — and her eyes look so strange, 
though she laughed the next minute. Oh ! oh ! ” 


SUGGESTION. 


25 


She stood perfectly still in the middle of the 
drawing-room, shaking her pretty clenched fists 
impotently in the air. She seemed consumed with 
sudden rage. Then quickly controlling herself she 
turned coldly to Oliver, who had risen to his feet 
with a look of triumph lurking in his eyes. 

“ Oliver Heriot,” she said, very earnestly, 
“ you know my father is the only friend you have 
left in the world, at this moment. I swear, if you 
go on using this horrible power of yours over me, 
that I will speak to him at once, and make him 
throw you over and forbid you the house. He 
will do it, if I speak to him.” 

Oliver knew that was quite true, and he knew 
that he could not afford to run any risks. He had 
brought himself down to the financial level when a 
comfortable dinner in a friend’s house is a luxury 
to be appreciated. And, moreover, he had a game 
to play. It was but vaguely outlined as yet ; but it 
was there. He hesitated a moment in his reply to 
Margery, only because he was not quite certain 
how best to influence her. A few moments ago 
he would simply have said — either aloud, or only 


26 


SUGGESTION. 


in thought — “ That’s all very well, but you can’t 
— you can’t resist me, so don’t try.” But Margery 
was just now very angry, all in arms, and in full 
possession of her faculties. He could not exercise 
any control over her while her mind was directed 
against him, only when her attention wandered 
away. He had found this out with the quickness 
of a fairly good poker player. He therefore pro- 
ceeded to distract her attention. 

“ Why, Margery,” he said in a business-like, 
straightforward voice, “ it isn’t like you to turn 
frightened and waste your good gifts. You know 
very well that if you would let me hypnotize you 
properly and make you clairvoyant there wouldn’t 
be any secrets for you any longer. You would 
know all about Mrs. Carruthers and everything 
else you wanted to know. If you’ve got a sixth 
sense why not use it ? ” 

At this moment Sir Charles Hawthorn walked 
into the room, and dinner was announced. The 
three went across the wide fire-lit hall, to the 
dining-room. Margery, having had no time to 
make any answer, was thinking over what Oliver 


SUGGESTION. 


27 


had said. It was hard for her to decide, in cold 
blood ; a longing for power and knowledge 
rushed upon her. She combated it, and almost had 
conquered, when the memory of Mrs. Carruthers’ 
pale exquisite face caqie back to her, and she saw 
again the change of color that Reginald Heriot’s 
name had brought on it. Oh, Iioav she loved 
Rex ! Could anyone ever come between them ! 
Hey heart throbbed and her vivid face flushed. 
She raised her eyes and looked at Oliver. He 
might be useful to her, yet ! Oliver felt the look, 
but did not answer it. 

44 Well, my boy,” said Sir Charles as soon as 
the servants had left the room, 44 have you decided 
to take my offer ? ” 

44 Yes, sir,” said Oliver, 44 1 have, and am very 
glad of it.” 

44 And so am I ; ” echoed Sir Charles heartily. 
44 You’re just the boy for me — lots of go in you — 
no funk. But you must turn over a new leaf, 
my lad ; that you must, if only to do me credit.” 

Margery said nothing, and was very silent 
until she left the table. The chief reason why Sir 


28 


SUGGESTION. 


Charles liked Oliver Heriot was that the younger 
man understood camaraderie to perfection. He 
knew just how to make himself agreeable to the 
person he was with. It was an easy task for him 
to please Sir Charles, who liked as a companion 
a man who could tell a racy story, and listen to 
one ; and who was willing to sit for a couple of 
hours over the dinner-table while his host drank 
port. For Sir Charles was of the old school and 
liked a sound wine and plenty of it. Oliver, who 
was of a wonderfully easy-going nature in trifles, 
could humor him in this way without getting 
bored. He would sip his Burgundy, tell a story 
now and then, and adroitly start Sir Charles upon 
story-telling on his own account, all the while 
thinking of something else. To-night he had 
plenty to think of. 

When at last they went upstairs they found 
Margery in her rocking-chair by the fire, swinging 
and apparently dreaming. She looked very happy 
and content. A letter was crushed in her left 
hand. It was from Reginald Heriot. He had 
not ridden over to see her to-day, as was his custom 


SUGGESTION. 


29 


every day ; and so had sent a groom over with this 
note. Evidently it was a very sweet one, to 
have made Margery look so beautiful. 

“ I want to see Mrs. Carruthers,” said Oliver, 
coming to stand, man-like, between Margery and 
the fire. “Won’t you ask her here and give me 
the chance?” 

“ Why, of course,” said Margery, smiling bliss- 
fully. u We’ll give a dinner party and ask every- 
body to meet her. All the world is longing to know 
the American girl, who is said to he fabulously 
rich and fabulously lovely. She certainly is lovely. 
I wonder where she keeps her husband ? ” 

“Why, in California, of course,” said Oliver, 
quite at a hazard. 

He was surprised at the effect his words pro- 
duced. Margery sat up straight and statue-like, 
staring fixedly at him. 

“ She said something about California,” she 
murmured to herself — “ I remember now. Mr. 
Carruthers is there.” 

“ Then no doubt she has met Rex when he was 
out there,” said Oliver cheerfully. 


30 


SUGGESTION. 


Sir Charles, who was in excellent spirits that 
evening, interrupted them at this point in the con- 
versation, and tried to get Margery to sing for 
him. But she was abstracted with her own 
thoughts, and left Oliver to amuse him. 


SUGGESTION . 


31 


CHAPTER III. 

The very next morning Miss Margery Haw- 
thorn wrote the invitations for her dinner party. 
Of course the Heriots were invited. Margery 
liked bringing things to a head, and getting to 
close quarters with any little trouble that threat- 
ened her. She wanted to see, at once, what effect 
Mrs. Carruthers would have upon Reginald. This 
fair American was the most beautiful woman 
Margery had ever seen, and she had a miserable 
conviction that any man would inevitably prefer 
her to her own dark self. How swarthy her face 
seemed as she looked at it, thinking of Mrs. Car- 
ruthers’ marvellous waxen pallor ; how large her 
strong, well-shaped hands appeared, contrasted 
with Mrs. Carruthers’ — so small that the brilliants 
with which they were laden seemed altogether too 
cumbrous. Margery was irritated by the sense of 
this little creature’s perfection, while at the same 
time she was fascinated by it. 


32 


SUGGESTION. 


Rex came over in the afternoon, as usual, and 
the lovers had a happy hour alone in the drawing- 
room, Sir Charles and Oliver being out, riding 
over the farm land. Margery told Rex about Mrs. 
Carruthers, of whose arrival at the old Hall he 
had of course already heard — for a rich American 
creates some excitement in a quiet country place 
— and boldly eased her mind by asking him if he 
had ever met her. 

“ I fancied she knew your name,” said Margery 
by way of explanation. 

“ I don’t know hers” said Rex ; “ tell me, what 
is she like ? ” 

“ Exquisitely beautiful,” said Margery, “ red- 
brown eyes, chestnut hair, a tiny waist ” 

“ I don’t like small waists,” interpolated Rex. 

“ Wonderful little hands, red lips, white 
teeth ” 

“ Oh, come,” said Rex, “ hundreds of American 
girls answer to this description. I don’t suppose 
I’ve ever seen her.” 

And in two minutes Mrs. Carruthers was en- 
tirely forgotten by both of them. 


SUGGESTION. 


33 


When Oliver came into the drawing-room be- 
fore dinner he saw at a glance that Margery was 
well content with the world at large. He was 
himself in a lazy and quiescent humor, having 
really done a good deal of work under Sir Charles’s 
eye. So he made himself placidly agreeable, and 
left Margery to dream her happy dreams undis- 
turbed. That evening was one of the quiet and 
pleasant ones so often spent in country houses; 
music, and chat about nothings, and light laughter 
filled up the short time between dinner and bed 
time. 

The next day was one of those which seem to 
carry misery in the very air. 

The first person who was cast into the depths 
was Oliver Heriot. The morning letters brought 
a dark gloom on his face which nothing lifted. 
He tried to rouse himself for Sir Charles’s amuse- 
ment ; but each effort was followed by a more pro- 
found reaction into dark thought and disgusted 
reverie. In fact, his position, was an exceedingly 
unpleasant one at the moment. Only those unfor- 
tunate people who have ever been in serious need 


34 


SUGGESTION. 


of a large sum of money will quite appreciate this 
young man’s emotions. But these unfortunates 
are so numerous that perhaps it is unnecessary to 
enter into any further description at present. 

He had nothing left to sell hut his horses. 
Those must go, of course. But they would only 
bring in a fraction of what he needed. As he sat 
at the table he now and again glanced across at 
Margery ; she was buried in a correspondence 
which seemed to amuse her for she was laugh- 
ing to herself. What a bright creature she 
looked. 

“ The old man likes me better than he likes 
Rex,” said Oliver to himself. “ He’d help me out 
of this hole. And she’s an heiress. Why can’t I 
make her like me better than Rex ? And yet I 
can’t! Well, I suppose I have gone the wrong 
way to work. With the influence I can get over 
her in some things I ought to be able to succeed. 
I must think it out.” 

He had to go over accounts and leases with Sir 
Charles that morning ; he got through pretty 
creditably, and congratulated himself on being a 


SUGGESTION. 


35 


very fair actor, when it was done ; for he had 
hardly understood anything. His stewardship 
with Sir Charles was a mere temporary makeshift 
— it gave him somewhere to live in good quarters, 
till he had hit on a new plan. But he could not 
give his mind to it in earnest, when his own 
affairs were worrying him. He had, however, long 
since found out that much may be done by attend- 
ing to appearances. The fact that he seemed to 
listen intelligently was usually enough for Sir 
Charles. 

Margery went riding in the morning; but in 
the afternoon stayed at home for Rex. Oliver had 
idled an hour away by the morning-room fire after 
lunch with her, and had told her what Rex had 
said to him about going to California again to get 
out of the quarrels at home. 

“ Has he said anything to you about it ? ” he 
asked. 

“No, indeed,” answered Margery, much sur- 
prised. 

“ I asked him what you would say to it, and he 
seemed rather wild with me for doing so.” 


36 


SUGGESTION. 


Margery told Rex of this when he came and 
asked him what it meant. 

“ Oh, nothing,” he said lightly. “ That day I 
did feel I couldn’t bear the life any longer. But 
the governor has not talked quite so much, since, 
and I daresay I can stand it. I wouldn’t go unless 
you would go with me — and it’s not the place 
for a honeymoon, to my fancy.” 

The talk after this was not much worth record- 
ing. The afternoon, cold and keen outside, was 
warm and flower-scented in the pleasant drawing- 
room of Hawthorndene ; and these two sat by the 
wood fire, letting the time slide by in that delight- 
ful oblivion that comes to us only when we are 
with those we love. Margery was in her accus- 
tomed rocking-chair, and Rex was lounging in a 
low deep chair by her side, when the door was 
opened and a servant announced — 

“ Mrs. Carruthers.” 

Margery rose quickly, as she always moved like 
a bird ; but Rex drew himself slowly out of the 
depths of his comfortable chair. Thus it was that 
when Margery had greeted her visitor, Rex had 


SUGGESTION. 


37 


only just turned to them, and Margery was free to 
look from one to the other. 

She caught a glance of intelligence pass be- 
tween them, a look of recognition. It was so 
perfectly clear to her that she expected Mrs. 
Carruthers to put out her hand and claim Rex as 
an old acquaintance. But no ; she stood there, 
a dream of loveliness, her fairness made the more 
exquisite by the dark furs she wore, a smile on 
her lips, her eyes innocent, inquiring, with the 
most candid expression in their warm depths. 
And Rex ? Margery turned sharply to him. He 
was looking down now, and stood passive and 
quiet, wearing the correct expression of the unin- 
troduced Englishman. 

Margery recovered her savoir faire in a moment, 
and introduced them. Rex bowed without look- 
ing up. Margery found herself, a moment 
later, sitting rocking again, and talking away 
with rather a feverish gayety and perhaps too easy 
a manner, to Mrs. Carruthers. That lady was 
quite self-possessed herself, but in a very different 
way. She was one who never showed excitement 


38 


SUGGESTION. 


or embarrassment; her widely opened eyes so 
beautiful, with the large black pupils and red 
lights round them, had always a surprised and 
innocent air. She seldom lowered her gaze, 
which was very direct, and her natural way of 
talking was dilatory ; she had nothing which 
could be called an American accent, but she had 
the peculiar intonation to a certain degree, and 
the drawl greatly softened. But there was some- 
thing about her speech which was quite her own 
— a certain breathlessness, as of suppressed excite- 
ment, as exhaustion after excitement. This little 
mannerism she never lost, so that it was really 
very difficult to tell when she was excited and 
when she was not. Now, as she sat talking to 
Margery, or, rather, answering her, in her pretty 
hesitating way, she might have been suffering 
acute embarrassment from Rex’s presence ; Mar- 
gery, however, had observed her with sufficient 
closeness already to know that she really showed 
no sign of it. 

Rex assumed the indolent, bored, indifferent 
manner which he wore sometimes, and which rather 


SUGGESTION. 


39 


became his handsome face than otherwise. Mrs. 
Carruthers certainly did not seem to awaken any 
interest in him. She excused herself for her 
informal call by her cleverly expressed wish to 
know more of Margery, whom she invited to lunch 
with her on the morrow ; she evidently proposed 
to become an intimate and make a friend of her. 
Margery accepted with enthusiasm. Mrs. Car- 
ruthers then asked Rex ; but he excused himself. 
Margery, watching like a lynx, saw Mrs. Carruth- 
ers throw a quick, inquiring glance at him, when 
he refused ; but he did not answer it. Afternoon 
tea came in, and two other callers, and presently 
Oliver ; and in the atmosphere of gay talk and 
laughter, Margery began to wonder whether she 
had been fanciful — whether she had simply 
imagined what had never happened. For Mrs. 
Carruthers was as meity as possible, with a child- 
like gayety that won all hearts; and Rex grew 
more like himself. Mrs. Carruthers was the first 
visitor to go, and everyone seemed sorry to lose 
her. She knew the art of taking leave just when 
she had interested everyone. How she interested 


40 


SUGGESTION. 


people it would be hard to say, for she had never 
been known to say a clever or a witty thing. But 
she was always a social success. 

Oliver went out to the hall door with her. She 
was driving a pair of very fine horses, and there 
was quite a little fuss over handing her in, talking 
about the horses, and seeing her start. The other 
callers also said good-bye and came out on to the 
steps, standing there to watch her go, before they 
got into their own carriages. That was one of 
Mrs. Carruthers’ personal peculiarities ; people 
followed her about to look at her, not always 
because they admired her, but rather because they 
were in some way fascinated by her. Not every- 
one thought her pretty; but even those who did 
not would stand to look at her, or walk a little way 
to watch her pass. 

Rex showed no inclination to follow her, how- 
ever ; he stood by the drawing-room fire, close to 
Margery, but not speaking. He seemed lost in 
some not very agreeable vein of thought. Margery 
tried to read his thoughts in his face, but she could 
not. No — his mind was a sealed book to her. 


SUGGESTION . 


41 


“ I know he is thinking of Mrs. Carruthers,” she 
said to herself ; “ but what is he thinking ? ” At 
last in despair she broke the silence. 

“ Isn’t she lovely ? ” she demanded. Rex did 
not pretend not to understand. 

“ What, Mrs. Carruthers ? ” he said coolly, and 
slowly. “ She is the kind of woman that would be 
called lovely by most people, but I don’t think her 
so. I don’t think she’s particularly good form, 
either. She evidently means to make a friend of 
you if she can manage it. Are you going to recip- 
rocate ? ” 

“ What else can I do ? ” said Margery. 

Rex shrugged his shoulders and said nothing. 
Then, a moment later — just as Mrs. Carruthers’ 
phaeton drove past the window — he said good-bye, 
and just as Oliver came into the room again, was 
leaving it. Margery hardly answered him ; she 
stood motionless ; he did not seem to notice her 
manner but went straight out. Oliver turned back 
and went with him to the door, talking about the 
sending of his horses from Heriot House to London 
to be sold. Rex promised to see them off ; but so 


42 


SUGGESTION. 


absent did he seem that Oliver repeated some 
directions over to him a second time. 

Margery stood just where she had been when 
Rex said good-bye to her; she looked up and 
watched him ride by. She was standing like that 
when Oliver returned, her eyes still on the 
window. 

“ Rex has gone very early,” said Oliver ; “ I 
can’t imagine what has taken him home at this 
time.” 

He approached Margery as he spoke and looked 
fixedly at her. At first it seemed as if she would 
not take any notice of him ; but presently she 
turned her head and her eyes met his. After a 
moment she replied, in a dull voice, 

“ He passes the gate of the old Hall, as you very 
well know. He is going to spend an hour with 
Mrs. Carruthers on his way home.” 

“ Did he tell you so ? ” asked Oliver with a 
sneer. 

She made no answer to this. 

“ So you’re jealous ? ” he said. 

She still made no answer. But Oliver had 


SUGGESTION. 


43 


caugnt ner eyes with his, as it were, and it seemed 
as if she could not turn them away. She made a 
desperate effort to resist his influence, and for 
a long while remained stubbornly silent. But 
suddenly her endurance gave way and she broke 
out into a wild passion. 

“ I’d give worlds — worlds — to know what they’ve 
been to each other — they’ve met before, I am 
certain of it — though they tried to hide it from me 
— Oh, what would I not give to know if he’s gone 
to her now I ” 


44 


SUGGESTION. 


CHAPTER IV. 

“ I expect that would be easy enough if you’d 
let me mesmerize you,” said Oliver coolly. 

She looked at him very earnestly. A battle 
was raging in her heart. After a moment’s pause 
she passed him by and went away, out of the room 
without a word. 

“ She’ll ask me to-morrow,” thought Oliver 
with a smile on his face, “ or if not to-morrow, the 
very next time the Carruthers drives her wild 
with jealousy. I’ll back her to do it, if anyone 
can ; she’s just the sort of woman. But Rex him- 
self ? I’m puzzled there. She’s not the sort of 
woman for him.” 

Margery went away by herself to try and think. 
She was suffering acutely ; torn hither and thith- 
er, and, for the first time in her life, experiencing 
the agony of jealousy. There is no pain or tor- 
ture like this, for it pervades the whole body ; it 
is physical pain, mental pain, emotional pain, all 


SUGGESTION. 


45 


in one. Had Rex loved that little fair creature 
and lost her? Did he love her still? Was he 
with her now, listening to that peculiar, lingering 
voice, looking into those marvellous eyes, so fas- 
cinatingly full of color and light and shade ? If 
so, what chance was there for her, Margery ? She 
must go away, hide herself, never see them again. 
— But what did she base all this on ! A glance — 
a look ! Oh, but that glance was conclusive. It 
was no use, she herself had seen it. They were 
old friends, these two, and understood each other. 
And in the first instant of meeting they had helped 
each other to deceive her — had acted for her- ben- 
efit. She had never imagined Rex could deceive ; 
it had seemed so unlike him as to appear impos- 
sible. If he would do it in one thing he would do 
it in others. 

Then her mind went to Oliver — and to her own 
curious faculties, discovered by the merest acci- 
dent, during those drawing-room experiments 
which they had amused themselves with. Sir 
Charles had thought it immense fun for Margery 
to be shut out of the room, and then, when she 


46 


SUGGESTION. 


was admitted, for her to do any foolish thing 
which he and Oliver had agreed upon. It amused 
him, too, to find that neither he nor Oliver were 
impressionable in this way. He was not given to 
the unfortunate habit of thinking, and it never 
occurred to him that there could be any further 
development from these trivial amusements. He 
would have been vastly surprised if he had been 
told that it simply meant that Oliver Heriot could 
put thoughts into his daughter’s mind and make 
her fancy them her own. 

Margery, however, who was very shrewd, per- 
fectly understood the situation, and to a certain 
extent understood its dangers. But she did not 
realize that they were already upon her ; that 
Oliver had now put the thought into her mind that 
she should ask him to mesmerize her and make 
her clairvoyant. The suggestion was working 
now as she walked about Jier room. She was 
intensely impatient of delay, and she was par- 
ticularly daring and fearless. Cautious people 
might have called her reckless. 

She never thought of being afraid of Oliver’s 


SUGGESTION. 


47 


influence over her, or of the exercise of her own 
faculties. Her only doubt was whether she ought 
to use these to spy upon Rex. This doubt would 
have finally held her back, it is certain, from mak- 
ing the experiment at all, but for the recollection, 
which stung cruelly whenever it came into her 
mind, of Rex’s readiness to deceive her. 

“ I must know the truth ! ” she exclaimed at last, 
speaking out loud in her excitement, and she 
opened her door and hurried downstairs. Oliver 
was still in the drawing-room alone, looking over 
some papers he had drawn from his pocket-book, a 
gloomy cloud on his forehead. He hastily put 
them away when she entered. 

“ Come,” she said, walking up to her favorite 
rocking-chair, and sitting down in it, “try your 
’prentice hand, Mr. Mesmerizer,^ and see if you can 
make me see visions and dream dreams.” She 
spoke with an affectation of gayety which did not 
deceive Oliver. He saw at once she was in 
earnest. 

“ Do you mean it ? ” he said. 

“ Of course I do,” she replied. “ But remember 


48 


SUGGESTION. 


I only want one thing — I want to sge Rex, to see 
where he is, and what he is doing. Be quick ! 
It’s too late for any more callers and we shan’t be 
disturbed for half an hour.” 

She leaned back in her chair and looked at him. 
Without any more words, Oliver came and stood 
over her, and fixed his eyes on hers. In a very few 
minutes her eyes turned upwards, showing the 
white underneath between the half-closed lids, as 
in very deep sleep. Oliver quietly made a few 
passes over her head and face. 

When he first discovered that he had this power 
over her, he had amused himself by going to a 
mesmerizing entertainment, in order to see how 
the thing was done by professionals. But he 
found, as he expected, that he scarcely needed to 
make any exertion. She was an exceedingly good 
subject, and she had of her own accord given up 
her will to his. She was almost immediately in 
a deep sleep. As soon as he felt assured this was 
so, he began to speak to her. 

“ Try now and follow Rex,” he said. “ Tell me 
if you can see him? ” 


SUGGESTION. 


49 


“ I can see him galloping down the drive,” she 
said, in a voice which rather startled Oliver, for it 
was not quite her own, “ he is riding very fast. I 
see, he is following a carriage ; he has overtaken it. 
The carriage stops ; there is a very pretty lady in 
it who speaks to him ; but it is only for a mo- 
ment ” 

44 Can’t you hear what they say ? ” asked Oliver. 

She remained very still for a little while, then 
she said 44 Yes.” 

“ Tell me what they say,” commanded Oliver. 

44 He only said to her, 4 When can I call, Mrs. 
Carruthers?’ and she answered, ‘Not to-morrow, 
I suppose?’ and he said, 4 Yes, I should like to 
come in the morning, if you will excuse my being 
so informal.’ ‘Very well,’ she replies, 4 about 
eleven J ’ Oh, I understand ! It is because Mar- 
gery will be there later ! oh how Margery will 
suffer over this ! ’ ” 

Her face altered from the expressionlessness of 

sleep or deep trance, to an expression of acute 

distress. Tears forced themselves between her 

half closed lids and rolled, unheeded, down her 
4 


50 


SUGGESTION. 


cheeks. Oliver was so completely surprised at 
her way of speaking that for a moment or two he 
stood silently gazing at her. Then at last he 
roused himself, remembering that she would prob- 
ably not speak again unless he questioned her. 

“ Why do you talk of Margery as some one 
else ? ” he said. “ You are Margery.” 

She shook her head. “ No,” she answered, 
“ Margery is the other. I am sorry, very sorry for 
her, she is suffering so much.” 

Sir Charles’s voice was to be heard in the hall 
at this moment ; he was coming towards the draw- 
ing-room. Oliver, who felt he was in deep waters 
that he did not himself yet understand, did not at 
all wish Sir Charles to share in the situation. He 
hastily exclaimed : “ Wake ! — Wake ! ” and made 
some upward passes, such as he had seen mes- 
merists use in rousing their subjects. Almost im- 
mediately Margery opened her eyes ; and when Sir 
Charles entered the room there was nothing un- 
usual to attract his attention, except that the fire 
wanted stirring. He was one of those cheery 
people who like a blaze, so he immediately started 


SUGGESTION. 


51 


with vigor upon the coals, soon making a leaping 
pyramid of flame which lit up all the room, grown 
dim with the twilight. He was full of some 
grievance about the stables and a new groom, and 
plunged at once into the history, relating it to 
Oliver with much spirit and noise. Suddenly he 
stopped short and then ejaculated — 44 God bless 
my soul ! Margery, my dear, my child, what’s the 
matter ? ” 

Oliver turned and looked at her. She was lean- 
ing forward in her chair, rocking herself to and 
fro like one in mortal pain. Tears fell fast, un- 
noticed, from her eyes. When her father spoke to 
her she burst out sobbing; then checking herself 
by a violent effort she got up and fled from the 
room. 

Lost in amazement Sir Charles turned round 
upon Oliver. 

44 What’s wrong ! ” he exclaimed. 44 Do you 
know anything about it, sir ? ” 

44 Not I,” answered Oliver instantly, 44 1 can’t 
imagine what’s happened.” 

44 Then it’s that brother of yours. A lover’s 


52 


SUGGESTION. 


quarrel, I suppose. I won’t have my child made 
unhappy ! I never saw her cry in all her life before. 
I’ll forbid him the house if he makes her cry. I’ll 
go and see if she will speak to me.” 

He followed Margery, leaving Oliver to the not 
very agreeable society of his own extremely con- 
fused and bewildered thoughts. He relieved his 
feelings as soon as he was alone, by a prolonged 
whistle ; a form of melody which has a surpris- 
ingly soothing effect on most men at critical mo- 
ments. Then he sat down and proceeded to 
think. 

After a few moments of profound thought he 
got up hurriedly and went to the library of the 
house — a dark little room at the back, for Sir 
Charles was no reader, and saw no use in giving 
up a room to books he never opened ; but, never- 
theless, lined with volumes on the walls, and 
crowded with them on the tables, for Margery was 
a great reader on all sorts of subjects. Oliver 
went to a certain obscure corner where, on a shelf, 
all together, stood a number of green paper-bound 
books. He searched among them till he found 


SUGGESTION. 


53 


the one he wanted, and then sat down to read it 
with close attention. It was a volume of Psychic 
Research reports, and the page he opened it at 
was on “ French Experiments on Strata of Per- 
sonality ” 


54 


SUGGESTION. 


CHAPTER V. 

He had not been able to read more than a few 
pages when he was interrupted by Sir Charles, 
who came in very disconsolately, evidently in 
need of someone to speak to. He never liked 
being alone, and particularly disliked it when 
anything worried him or put him out. So he came 
straight to Oliver with his troubles, like a grown- 
up child. 

“ She is in such a state of distress she really 
cannot explain herself,” he said ; “ but it’s evi- 
dently something wrong about Rex. It seems to 
me that she has got a fit of jealousy. But who of 
and why ? What is it all about ? Do you really 
know nothing about the matter ? ” 

Oliver shook his head, meantime turning over the 
pages of the book in his hand, in search of ideas upon 
the subject that absorbed him. Suddenly, it seemed 
to him he had hit upon the explanation of Mar- 


SUGGESTION. 


55 


gery’s present exceedingly distressed state. He 
had intensified the idea already in her mind ; 
possibly, if he had chosen he could have left her, 
on awaking, quite oblivious of what she had seen 
in her state of morbid consciousness. Instead of 
that he, acting unscientifically, and thinking about 
it himself, had left it burned into her mind. 

44 It really seems as if it depends on me now, 
whether she is to be jealous of Rex or not,” he 
thought ; “ upon my word that opens a queer vista 
of possibilities. I think I’ll go out and see if 
that sick mare has had her mash ” — this last he 
said aloud, prompted by a keen desire to escape 
from Sir Charles’s presence. 

44 1 wonder if it would be right ! ” he thought. 
44 1 wonder if it is all some devil’s work ? ” As 
this struck him he stood still and stared up at the 
starlit sky. He had got out of the house and 
was standing on the broad gravel terrace in front 
of it. One large window upstairs was brightly 
lit up. It was the window of Margery’s room. 
He looked from the stars to the light of her lamp, 
and back again. But no direct inspiration or 


56 


SUGGESTION. 


guidance came to him either way. He was left to 
puzzle the matter out for himself, and attend to 
his own casuistry. 

Oliver Heriot’s was one of those complex 
natures which find life full of pleasure, but also 
full of pain and difficulty. He would give a great 
deal of thought as to his course of action under 
given circumstances, and yet, after all, act entirely 
upon impulse. His love of pleasure and excite- 
ment was intense, and when roused was completely 
master of him ; desire pulled him hither and 
thither, and made a mere puppet of him. His con- 
duct was too often that of the ordinary rake and 
profligate, apparently unaffected by any consider- 
ations of heart or conscience. But this was not 
by any means his real character ; after the event 
he would be smitten with remorse, and indeed be- 
fore it. His mind was sufficiently intelligent to 
show him beforehand, only too plainly for his own 
peace of mind, that what he was about to do was 
not right and would distress his conscience after- 
wards. What he lacked was the resolution to 
obey either heart or conscience when the moment 


SUGGESTION. 


57 


of temptation came. Against his better knowledge 
he committed his follies and faults. 

But Oliver had more than the sense of right and 
wrong, which indeed most of us possess in a more 
or less positive form. He had the religious mind, 
and he experienced not only remorse but fear. He 
believed that from those starlit skies an eye watched 
him and observed his doings, and, in due time, 
would punish him for such of them as were wrong. 
He had none of the consolations of the modern 
unbeliever who walks daringly into the dark abyss 
of the future, fearless of it because convinced that 
there is nothing there either to fear or to hope for. 
Such a condition was unimaginable to him. When 
he did wrong he did it like a child who trembles 
with the knowledge of a safe and certain rod in 
pickle. To a man of this mode of thought, or 
perhaps it would be more correct to say of feeling, 
it is only natural that the mysterious powers we 
call hypnotism and mesmerism should not appear 
as forces of supernature, lending themselves to 
scientific research, but as the gifts either of God 
or of the devil. It seemed to him, as it would 


58 


SUGGESTION. 


seem to most of ns, that there was really something 
rather satanic about this power of his which he 
could exercise over Margery. For the time being 
he used her will, not she. 

Realizing it almost in these words, as he sud- 
denly did, brought a strange thrill upon him. 
Using her will ! — that described his power very 
well. He could use it. To what end should he 
use it ? How could Margery benefit him ? He 
was not at all in love with her ; not in the least — 
otherwise the question would have been a very 
easy one to answer. But, impressionable as Oliver 
was in many ways, he had never suffered love, and 
did not know what it meant. He knew what 
pleasure was, though, very well ; and knew that 
unless some kind streak of fate brought relief to 
him, pleasure would be his no more, for a very 
long time to come. 

The mare had had her warm mash a good hour 
before Oliver visited her. He did so at last, for 
the sake of appearances, after a good brisk walk in 
the shrubberies ; then he went back to the house 


SUGGESTION. 


59 


for the inevitable brandy-and-soda and cigar with 
Sir Charles before bed. 

Sir Charles was very much out of sorts that 
evening, for he was devoted to Margery, and when 
anything went wrong with her it altered everything 
for him. Oliver found it an uncommonly dull 
seance, and sincerely wished himself in London or 
Paris, where a cab would quickly bring him into 
the haunts of what he called civilization. To be 
amused was his prime need ; and he was at present 
in such a very tight place in his affairs that he 
could not even present himself in those agreeable 
places where amusement was to be found. Some- 
thing must be done ! — but what ? 

Yesterday he had not an idea. Now he thought 
obscurely of Margery, what might she not do for 
him ! He went to bed and determined to sleep on 
his chaotic thoughts, in the hope of forming some 
clearer plan for the morrow. 

The breakfast-table at Hawthorndene was gen- 
erally very gay. Sir Charles in the most boisterous 
spirits, and Margery, with that fresh morning face 
and mien which are one of the great beauties of 


GO 


SUGGESTION. 


the young and healthy. But on this next morn- 
ing the meal had none of its usual brightness. 
Margery was quiet, but very pale and evidently 
very nervous. Sir Charles simply followed her 
humor, and kept watching her as a dog watches 
his master when he thinks there is something 
wrong and cannot guess what it is. Oliver was 
disgusted to find he was no nearer a solution of his 
problem than overnight, and his anxieties would 
give him no rest. It is quite surprising how acute 
pecuniary difficulties sharpen the wits and keep 
the brains at work. A man who is a comparative 
dullard one day, discovers a hitherto hidden talent 
the next. But even more surprising is the way in 
which an intolerable need of money alters the 
moral sense. Oliver found himself quietly con- 
sidering what Margery possessed that would be 
worth his having. Her check-book did not present 
sufficient temptation ; although she was an heiress, 
she now only commanded a fairly good allowance. 
Herself — well, yes, she was worth having, and he 
meant to make a very steady try for that. But 
that might take time — almost certainly would. 


SUGGESTION. 61 

And an alleviation for the moment was wnat he 
wanted. 

Yesterday morning he would never have sup- 
posed he could coolly weigh these things in his 
mind and speak so plainly to himself. But then 
he had had his fits of remorse overnight, before- 
hand, under the stars. It was broad daylight now, 
and money or the want of it seemed more real than 
right or wrong. 

Margery only gave him a very cold good-morn- 
ing, did not speak to him afterwards, and scarcely 
lifted her eyelids. Was she afraid of him? or was 
she angry with him? Well, he concluded, it mat- 
tered very little. If he used his power resolutely 
he could alter her mood as he chose. Could this 
be so? he asked himself, in fits of doubt. Was it 
possible that one human being could have so much 
influence over another ? and that other such a deter- 
mined person as Margery Hawthorn ? for undeni- 
ably that young lady had twice his own resolution. 
Glancing up at her pale, set face in the strong 
morning sunshine, he thought to himself over and 
over again that he must be wrong in his memory, — 


62 


SUGGESTION. 


that she could never have been influenced by him as 
she had been. This was not the plastic, weak- 
willed creature which popular imagination pictures 
the easily mesmerized subject. 

Oliver knew nothing of the deeper and more 
unintelligible part of the mystery, although it was 
even now taking place before his eyes. Margery 
herself knew nothing of it, though she herself was 
actually conducting it. As she sat at the table, 
listless preoccupied, she was all the while literally 
hypnotizing herself and placing herself under 
Oliver’s dominance. She tried to put the whole 
thing out of her mind, but it was impossible to do 
so, for her intense love for Rex and her desperate 
jealousy of him, conquered her more reasonable 
thoughts. The eyes of her mind were fixed on 
Rex so steadily that she was unable to bring any 
other subject within view. We must all have 
experienced the peculiar effect, when one is greatly 
troubled about some particular thing or person, of 
being really unable to think of anything else. The 
attempt is only a pretence ; and we find the old 
image back again in less than an instant of time 


SUGGESTION. 


68 


because it has never been displaced at all. So it 
was with Margery this morning. She had but one 
vision — Rex in Mrs. Carruthers’ drawing-room ; 
but one thought — what has he to say to her ? Her 
intense longing to answer this last question, and 
her complete belief that Oliver could enable her to 
do so, practically placed her in his hands without 
his having to make any effort, if he could but have 
understood this. But he did not, nor did he im- 
agine that but for this absorbed and prepared state 
of her own mind he would have had no such tre- 
mendous power over her as he soon found to be in 
his hands. He imagined all the mystery to be in 
himself, and trembled, when he thought of it, as to 
whence his gift came. This confusion between 
cause and effect is very common in matters of every 
day — still more so in these matters which we do 
not fully understand. It is so natural to fancy all 
the power and the mystery lie in oneself ! 

Oliver’s sense of this filled him with an exciting 
feeling of responsibility. He was a born gambler 
and he felt as if he had learned a new game and 
was not quite certain yet of his own skill in 


64 


SUGGESTION. 


playing it. What card should he put down next ? 
He could not determine. 

But, as so very often happens for us in life, his 
card was played for him. 

They were always late people at breakfast, and 
to-day they sat later than usual. The whole reason 
was in Margery, who had been behind her time 
at the table and did not seem disposed to leave it. 
The others, for very different reasons, hung about, 
watching her. At last Sir Charles lit a cigar and 
went off to the stables. He took Oliver with him 
perforce. Oliver had intended to remain with 
Margery and speak to her, but could find no ex- 
cuse. In a very preoccupied manner he followed 
Sir Charles, and joined as well as he could in the 
stable-talk. 

Presently he caught sight of a figure which at- 
tracted his attention ; a slight, darkly-clad figure, 
leaning on the gate between the stable-yard and 
the flower garden. It was Margery. She was 
looking towards him. He immediately threw away 
the cigar he was smoking and went to her, deter- 
mined to trust to the inspiration of the moment for 


SUGGESTION. 


65 


what he should do and say. Her face was quite 
drawn and white from mental distress. She had 
put on a straw garden hat, and drawn a dark shawl 
over her shoulders. She looked prettier than ever 
with this new pathetic, anxious look upon her 
usually gay face. 

“ Don’t you know,” she said in the dull, con- 
strained voice which he had heard her use before 
under strong excitement, “ don’t you know it’s 
past eleven ! I can’t help it, Oliver — I can’t help 
it ! I never meant to speak to you of this again — 
but, oh, when the time comes and I know he is 
with her I can’t bear it — I can’t bear it ! ” 

“ You’ve no reason to be so distressed as this,” 
said Oliver ; “ you don’t know that you have any 
cause to be jealous ! ” 

She suddenly broke into sobs, and the gate she 
leaned against shook with the violence of her 
passion. 

“It is no use to talk to me !” she exclaimed 

wildly, “ I am ashamed of myself that I have let 

you see all my misery so plainly, and that you 

should know about it ! But I cannot help it ! 

5 


66 


SUGGESTION. 


’Tis no use. And I must know — I must know 
the truth. Do what you did yesterday, Oliver, so 
that I can hear what they are saying to each other ! 
It is like playing the spy — I know it — I am 
ashamed of it — but I can’t help it. Come ! ” 

She opened the gate herself for him to pass 
through. His conscience pricked him. The 
thing was so easy, so given into his hands, that 
he, in his turn, was ashamed. 

“ I don’t know if it’s right, Margery,” he said 
in a hesitating voice. 

“ I don’t care if it’s right or wrong,” she blazed 
out in sudden violence. “ I have made up my 
mind to know the truth. I cannot bear this sus- 
pense and anxiety any longer. Why should I? 
I have a right to know the truth ! ” 

This was the one idea in her mind at the mo- 
ment and it seemed quite useless to try to bring 
any other aspect of the affair before her. She 
turned and walked hurriedly down one of the 
garden paths and Oliver followed her more slowly. 


SUGGESTION . 


67 


CHAPTER VI. 

Mrs. Carrttthers was one of those rare 
flowers of womanhood that are produced in per- 
fection in southern America ; essentially exotic in 
every characteristic. She was delicate and fragile 
to the last degree, yet full of a subtle vitality 
which was almost like hardiness. She did not 
like rising early, and found it hard to present her- 
self, in the English manner, fully dressed in the 
forenoon. But when she did this, she did it to 
perfection ; there was no dull languor in her face 
as with a sickly Englishwoman. She was fresh as 
a white hot-house rose, the pallor of her face hav- 
ing a perfectly healthy appearance — whether the 
result of art or nature none could tell, and who 
cared? — there was nothing to show delicacy but 
the deep blue-green circles under her eyes which 
might have been the work of art, so deep were 
they — but these certainly were not. 

Just like this, an exquisite smile on her soft 


G8 


SUGGESTION. 


mouth, bringing into play two dainty dimples, 
and a roguish gleam of fun in her eyes — a picture 
of happy beauty — was Amy Carruthers, as she sat 
in the dark morning-room in the old Hall when 
Eex Heriot was shown in. 

“ How beautiful you look,” he said, immedi- 
ately, and without thought, as one might have said 
it to a child. 

“ I am glad you think so ! ” she answered, with 
her merry laugh, which only appeared mechanical, 
like a canary’s roulade, after one had heard it a 
good many times, and with the glance from her 
great eyes which she had never yet found any 
man resist. 

“It’s no matter of thinking,” he replied. “It’s 
so patent a fact. You are a marvel — you have 
done wonderfully ! ” he went on, a tone of honest 
admiration in his voice. 

“ I had no idea of meeting you in England,” 
said Mrs. Carruthers, with the simple, graceful 
manner of a lady addressing an old acquaintance. 
“ I was very much surprised to find you really a 
neighbor.” 


SUGGESTION. 


69 


“ I suppose so” said Rex rather dryly. Then, 
with a certain abruptness he went on, “ What are 
you going to do ? ” 

“ Going to do?” she echoed. 

“ Are you going into society ? ” 

“ Why, of course. Why not ? ” 

“ Why not, indeed ! You’ll be an acquisition 
here, where society is usually as slow as a Sunday 
school. But who have you with you ? Where’s 
Carruthers ? ” 

“ In New York. He’s coming over.” 

“ And who is Carruthers?” There was a faint 
insolence in this question or rather in the way 
in which it was asked, which would very much 
have surprised Margery. It would scarcely have 
seemed to her to be Rex who was speaking. But 
it was, and though the thinly-disguised rudeness 
gave his face a disagreeable look, it lent a curious 
handsomeness to it at the same time. Mrs. Car- 
ruthers darted a very dangerous glance at him ; a 
glance in which she seemed to be taking his 
measure and questioning his intent. She an- 


70 


SUGGESTION. 


swered with a perfect nonchalance, and as if in 
reply to the most friendly speech. 

“ Oh, you know him quite well ; you met him 
in California.” 

“ What ! Carruthers, the millionaire ? You don’t 
mean it ? ” 

“Why not? ” 

“ Such a gentlemanly fellow — neat as a new 

pin ” Suddenly a dark flush rose in Rex’s face. 

“ I beg your pardon ! ” he said. 

“ Oh, you needn’t,” said Amy Carruthers, with 
the sweetest of smiles. “ I know my husband is 
awfully particular — but — I satisfy him. Isn’t that 
enough ? ” 

“I should say so. How did you come to meet 
him?” 

“ Does all that interest you ? Surely not ! Mr. 
Heriot, isn’t it a good plan to live for the present 
moment ? Isn’t it a rather philosophical idea ? I’m 
very stupid, I know, but I fancy somebody very 
clever recommended that.” 

“ You’re quite right, Mrs. Carruthers,” said Rex, 
looking down with evident embarrassment, “ and 


SUGGESTION. 


71 


I assure you I’m the last man in the world to 
wish to destroy the pleasantness of the present 
moment. You’re quite safe in that, so far as I’m 
concerned. But I want you to do just one little 
thing for me.” 

“And what is that ? You know I’m one of the 
most good-tempered people in the world, don’t 
you?” 

“ Oh, yes ! I know you are ; really that’s one 
of your most delightful qualities. Well! you’ve 
heard, I suppose, even in the short time you have 
been here, that I am engaged to Miss Hawthorn.” 

“ Of course ; and it shows your good taste ! ” 

“ You like her? ” 

“ Indeed yes.” 

“ That is not what I mean. Do you like her, 
or do you think she will be useful to you? Come, 
tell me the truth ! ” 

Oh, how foolish a man is when he tries to force 
the hand of such a woman as this ! 

“ I like and admire her immensely, and I own I 
think she will be useful to me, for everyone seems 
fond of her, and of course I want to find good 


72 


SUGGESTION. 


friends — kind friends, charitable hearts ; I am 
sure she is good, kind, and charitable. English 
people are not all this, as a rule, and I am 
frightened amongst them — with all of them but 
her!” 

It was said with the most exquisitely pitiful 
air. Rex, looking at her lovely face, accepted all 
she said. It never occurred to him that it was not 
society, but himself, whom she desired to disarm 
through Margery ; that the instant she had heard 
she was engaged to him she had resolved to win 
the girl’s heart as quickly as possible. Instead of 
letting him suspect this she at once seized upon 
his own good nature. A gentler expression came 
upon his face, for her perfect manner appealed to 
him, &nd he felt sorry for her. 

“ Oh, yes,” he said, “ Margery is good-hearted. 
What I wanted to say sounds almost too brutal.” 

“ Say it ! ” As she spoke she rose and moved 
to the window, and then turned abruptly and 
came towards him. Her figure was shown to 
perfection in the soft morning robe she wore, 
and no man living could have looked at her with- 


SUGGESTION. 


78 


out admiration as she moved in the sunlight. 
Her face was very sad and her great dark eyes 
were full of tears. She paused a little way from 
him, and fixed these softened eyes on his. 

“ Say it ! It doesn’t matter if it’s brutal. I’ve 
been used to brutality — in the past/’ 

“ Don’t speak like that ! It’s unbearable ! ” 

His thought, as he watched her, was, “ How 
much of all this does she mean ? But a fellow 
can’t be hard on such a soft little thing.” 

Hers was — “ How long will it take to make 
him fall in love with me ? ” 

She laughed, lightly enough, and sat down 
again in her chair. “ Please don’t hesitate any 
longer — I hate delay ! ” 

“ Oh, well ! ” he answered, rather shamefacedly, 
“it’s only this — I wish you wouldn’t make a 
special friend of Miss Hawthorn. There — I’ve 
got it out.” 

She lowered her eyes, and seemed plunged in 
profound thought. It lasted but a minute or two. 

“I’ll do just as you wish ! ” she said earnestly. 
“ I’ll make her dislike me if I can. But whether 


74 


SUGGESTION. 


or no, I swear to you she’ll never regret having 
known me.” 

“ That’s all right,” said Rex with an air of 
honest relief, for her serious tone convinced him 
of her genuineness. “ I’m sure you’ll keep your 
word.” 

“Why, of course,” she said, with an exquisitely 
pathetic gesture. “ Am I not entirely at your 
mercy ? ” 

Rex, like an Englishman, answered her rather 
roughly. “ Nonsense ! ” he exclaimed. “ As if I 
would injure a woman ! ” 

She looked up at him — only for a second, a 
quick, shrewd glance — and then looked down 
again as she spoke. 

“ No,” she said, “ I know you would not do that 
— you are a gentleman. But you won’t prejudice 
Miss Hawthorn against me, will you ? — Of course, 
I don’t mean openly, hut by ever so little a 
slight? For I will keep my word; and I cannot 
tell you what a priceless boon it is to me to speak 
to such a true lady as she is. You know, Mr. 
Heriot, we don’t get stamped for life — at least, I 


SUGGESTION. 


75 


hope not. You, for instance, you don’t find you 
must kill a man every day, do you ? ”, 

Rex started as if he had been shot, and turned 
white to the lips. But he said nothing ; only 
looked at her. She met his gaze and smiled. 

“We all of us find it convenient at times,” she 
said very softly, “ to forget both what has hap- 
pened to ourselves and to others in the past. Isn’t 
it so? Will you stay to lunch? And then you 
need not feel any anxiety about Miss Hawthorn 
—for to-day at least.” 

“ Thanks — no — I don’t think I can,” said Rex. 
“You see, she — well, she wouldn’t know how I 
came to be here in the morning. No, I think I’d 
better not. Thank you all the same. I’ll trust her 
to you. Good-bye — I must be going, or else I shall 
meet her at the door, which would be rather more 
foolish than if I stayed.” 

« Why, yes, so it would,” said Mrs. Carruthers, 
with her bird laugh, throwing off all her pathetic 
manner in a moment. “Well, if you must go, 
go ; but come again very soon. Why not come 
in the afternoon? No one will be any the wiser. 


76 


SUGGESTION. 


Do! We shall be a party of ladies unless some 
callers take pity on us. Did I tell you Miss Car- 
ruthers is here ? She is awfully dull. There’s no 
society at all in England, according to her ; but 
then of course she hasn’t seen much yet. You’ll 
like her if you like a downright American girl.” 

“ If I can manage it I will come in the after- 
noon,” said Rex; and so took his departure. 

He had not been gone ten minutes — during 
which interval Mrs. Carruthers had remained quite 
still, in a profound reverie — when Margery Haw- 
thorn, was announced, and entered the room. She 
came in very nervously, and looked round with a 
quick, apprehensive glance. Apparently she was 
disappointed in something. With an evident 
effort she controlled herself, and replied to Mrs. 
Carruthers’ greeting. 

“ I believe I am very early,” she said. “ It is 
such a lovely morning I could not stay indoors.” 

“ Don’t apologize ! ” exclaimed Mrs. Carruthers, 
with her beautiful smile. “ You know how glad I 
am to see you. It is so good of you to come in 
this informal way. It is the sort of kindness that 


SUGGESTION. 


77 


a stranger like myself appreciates to the full. 
I can’t tell you how happy it makes me feel. It’s 
lonely here at first, you know, without my husband. 
I hope he’ll be over very soon, though. Sit down 
here by the fire and get warm. I am going to 
give you a glass of wine, for you are as white as a 
sheet.” 

It was quite true. Margery was not herself ; 
her rich color had left her, her bright face was 
drawn and haggard. She scarcely seemed able to 
speak. The necessity for some kind of speech 
opened her lips at last. 

“ I believe I am not very well,” she said. 
“ Yes, I will have some wine. I think it must be 
the cold.” 

And all the while she was looking round the 
room with the same anxious, eager look that had 
been on her face from the first moment when she 
entered. 

She was so convinced that Rex was in the room 
that she still looked round it for him. His figure 
was so clearly photographed before her mind’s 
eye, standing here amid these surroundings — which 


78 


SUGGESTION. 


till this moment she had never seen in reality 
before — that it seemed as if her failure to see him 
now must be an optical delusion. Where was he ? 
With a mighty effort she controlled herself, when 
the question was actually on her tongue. 

Amy Carruthers was quite shrewd enough to be 
perfectly aware that Margery’s distress was mental, 
and had nothing to do with cold, or any other 
physical circumstance. But she was completely 
at a loss as to what it could be due to, having no 
clew of any sort. Like Sir Charles, she imagined 
it must be the result of a lovers’ quarrel, but she 
was puzzled at having seen no signs of this in Rex 
himself. She flattered herself he would never have 
been able to conceal it from her. 

She brought Margery a glass of port wine herself, 
and watched her drink it, talking the while about 
the cold, and the necessity for taking care of 
oneself. The wine and the fire together did bring 
back a certain amount of color to Margery’s face, 
and she began to look a little more natural. Tor 
physical comfort or discomfort tells more strongly 
on people when suffering emotionally than under 


SUGGESTION . 


79 


any other conditions. And Margery had reached 
that extreme point of mental misery and anxiety 
which is really a state of exhaustion ; even a faint 
ray of physical warmth and comfort cheered 
and restored her a little. The effect simply was 
to make her remember that this woman who was 
apparently so kind to her, was in reality her arch- 
enemy — her rival — a much worse word ! Her 
rival, yes, and perhaps even more, a safe and 
assured one, while she herself, Margery, who had 
given her whole innocent, untried heart to Rex, 
was to suffer these tortures of uncertainty and 
doubt. 

They were both completely in the dark, and 
could only watch and wait. 

Both being possessed of great mechanical ease of 
manner, a fairly good presentment of conversation 
was carried on about mere trifles until, to the great 
relief of both, a distraction was caused by Miss 
Carruthers coming into the room. 

Margery had never formed a serious attachment 
to any woman in her life as yet ; but her heart 
went out to Hetty Carruthers the moment she saw 


80 SUGGESTION. 

her. The interest aroused was mutual ; and sprang 
into an affection which never altered, but served as 
a support and compact through all the troubles 
that lay before these two. The candid and honest 
hearts, the fresh and unsophisticated natures, 
recognized and trusted each other on the instant. 

The two feelings immediately roused by Hetty 
Carruthers’ entrance into any English drawing- 
room were, first, profound admiration, and after- 
wards immense amusement. She was just what 
Mrs. Carruthers had said, a true American girl ; 
but of the most marked type and the most attractive 
order. Her beauty was extraordinary, in its own 
way. If Mrs. Carruthers was like a hot-house 
flower this girl was like a field rose. Her perfectly 
shaped face had always a vivid flush on it that 
looked as if she had just been burnt by the sun or 
the fire ; her blue eyes were like drops of water 
with the sun shining on them; her head was 
crowned by a quantity of rather rough bronze hair 
that was too thick ever to be forced into the fashion, 
but which escaped from its pins and fell in loose 
untidiness. And her figure ! — thin to a fault, 


SUGGESTION. 


81 


quite undeveloped, but splendidly shaped, and so 
supple she could throw herself about like a Moorish 
dancing girl — and indeed, found it hard to keep 
her movements sufficiently conventional. 

Carruthers the millionaire was one of mushroom 
growth, and his sister had spent all her life hitherto 
in climbing apple trees, riding half-wild ponies 
bare-backed, cooking, and making butter — in all 
the work and play of a country farm. He had 
brought her away from home now to acquire the 
polish which had long since been rubbed into him- 
self. At present an amused look came on every 
face the moment this beautiful creature opened her 
mouth ; and Amy Carruthers was continually re- 
questing her to keep it shut as much as possible. 
The consequence was Hetty felt like a child at 
school, and longed for someone to whom she could 
speak freely and pour out all her heart. 

In five minutes she had made Margery feel 
almost like herself again, for she had made her 
laugh ; and the mere fact of laughing will, for the 
moment, throw off the deepest despair. 

Mrs. Carruthers left them alone a little while ; 

6 


82 


SUGGESTION. 


she was not particularly anxious as to what Hetty 
said to Margery, and did not feel it necessary to 
stay on guard as she would have done had there 
been a man or a severely critical matron present. 

“You look awful nice,” said Hetty drawing her 
chair up to the fire and looking at Margery intently. 
“ I declare I ain’t seen anyone look as nice and 
straight as you do since I came to this country. 
Say, now Amy’s away a minute, do tell — you live 
here, don’t you ? ” 

“Yes,” said Margery ; “quite near.” 

“ What, all the time ? Well, look here, I don’t 
see how you hold on if there ain’t any nice fellers 
round. Oh, but I forgot, Amy says you don’t call 
’em fellers over here. Is that so? You don’t? 
W ell, then what do you call ’em, anyway ? Men ? 
Yes ? W ell, I s’pose I’ll learn in time. But ’tain’t 
easy. Well, don’t they grow in this country? I 
ain’t seen one since I came over. Ain’t there any 
real nice ones, that takes the girls round and gives 
’em parties ? I don’t seem to understand things 
over here. Why, I’m only a girl, and never been 
anywhere, but I’ve lots of fellers home — they’re 


SUGGESTION. 


83 


always carrying on with some fun or other. I 
don’t seem to understand being so awful dull as 
we are here. We don’t ever have areal good time 
at all, and I don’t b’lieve we’re ever going to. It’s 
always dressing and sitting up, just like prayer 
meeting. Say, is it like that all the time over 
here ? I only wish Joseph had left me at home — I 
don’t want to see Europe I don’t think the whole 
show’s worth a cent. I only wish I was back home. 
But there, it does seem awful nice to see anyone 
laugh nat’ral, like you do. You’ll have to be good 
to me and tell me what I’m to say to the fellers, 
for I declare Amy’s made me that scared I daren’t 
hardly open my mouth. Well, I declare there’s 
the lunch hell, and I am glad — I’m just as starved 
as anybody can be and live. I do believe it’s being 
so awful moped makes me so hungry. I hope you 
eat, so I won’t be ashamed, for Amy only pecks up 
little bits. Nobody could live on what she eats, 
and I believe she has lots up in her dressing-room. 
’Tain’t manners, I guess, to eat when folks is 
’round.” 

One great advantage about Hetty Carruthers’ 


84 


SUGGESTION. 


style of conversation was that she never wanted 
any answer. She took her cue from the expression 
of the person she was talking to, and went on with 
her monologue. 

With the sound of the church bell came Mrs. 
Carruthers ; and with her entrance came the wave 
of despair and doubt again upon Margery’s spirit, 
which Hetty’s bright presence had momentarily 
lifted. 

These three lunched alone, sitting in a little 
group at the end of a great oval dining-table 
loaded with silver, and waited on by most gor- 
geous footmen. The establishment was on a very 
splendid scale. Before the Carruthers took it, the 
Hall had been a rather dark and dreary example 
of a historic county show-house. They had filled 
in the substantial framework with all kinds of 
grandeur and glitter which it amused Margery to 
observe. The mingled effect seemed to her odd, 
and yet it was attractive. Some of the rooms 
they had entirely re-furnished, as, for instance, 

* 

the morning-room. It was no wonder when 
Margery came in that she grew pale, even if 


SUGGESTION. 


85 


anxiety liacl not caused lier to do so. For in her 
hypnotic vision she had seen Rex standing there 
by the plush-covered gilt-dressed chair from which 
he had risen, with a gold and white harp-shaped 
screen behind him. These were the first objects 
her eyes fell upon, and it startled her, for when 
she had called on Mrs. Carrutliers she had been 
received in the drawing-room, and she knew noth- 
ing about the morning-room or how it was fur- 
nished. The circumstance gave her a strangely 
eerie and unnatural feeling. From this eerieness, 
and from her excited and miserable state, she was 
distracted by Hetty Carrutliers’ quaintness and 
what seemed to her the almost theatrical pomp 
and circumstance with which the house was filled. 
To her country-bred eyes, everything about Mrs. 
Carrutliers was surprising, from the Paris gown 
she wore, to the chair she sat in — just as French 
as the dress. For Mrs. Carruthers was one of 
that class of Americans who do not believe any- 
thing can be bought except in Paris, and who 
thinks everything bought there must be correct, 
especially if there is enough gilding about it. 


86 


SUGGESTION. 


When Amy Carruthers chose she could be the 
most fascinating little creature imaginable, and 
hard it was for man or woman to resist her. Hetty, 
who, though simple, was shrewd, knew her well 
enough to be able to discern the difference be- 
tween the charm of her ordinary society manner 
and the subtle fascination which she occasionally 
put forth. She was using this to-day, and for 
Margery’s benefit. Hetty was so surprised at this 
and so much taken up with thinking what the 
reason could be, that she scarcely spoke. This 
was a great relief of Mrs. Carruthers, who had 
learned so to dread the plain Yankeeisms of her 
sister-in-law that she was only too thankful if she 
preserved silence. 

Margery was won, slowly, but surely. Before 
lunch was over she had arrived at that mental 
state in which she felt that if Rex had ever loved 
this woman — if he did love her now! — he had 
every excuse. But Mrs. Carruthers was acting in 
the dark. She could not guess that Margery had 
already been made so jealous that her admiration 
for her would only intensify the feeling. She had 


SUGGESTION. 


87 


no means of guessing at this, Margery’s knowl- 
edge, such as it was, having been gained abnor- 
mally. 

The experience of the morning had been one of 
agony to her. Sir Charles had caught sight of 
herself and Oliver, as they were going into the 
garden, and followed them. He had no particular 
reason for doing this except a gregarious instinct, 
and a desire to be Avith Margery, about whom he 
felt so anxious. He walked by her side, talking, 
and smoking. Margery had to simulate some kind 
of interest in the conversation, because she felt 
that if she showed her distress of mind he would 
become so anxious that he would not leave her 
alone at all. This went on for an hour, till at last 
Margery went into the house, saying she was 
tired. 

“ Come with me, Oliver,” she said, desperately. 
“ There’s something I want you to do for me.” 

“ Which means, the old fellow may go back to 
the stables by himself,” said Sir Charles good- 
humoredly, “ all right, Madge. Did you say you 
were going out to lunch ? ” 


88 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Yes, papa, to Mrs. Carruthers’.” 

“Pretty little woman, that! Well, I hope 
she’ll cheer you up, and you’ll be just yourself 
again by dinner time.” 

Margery walked straight into the house, silently. 
Oliver followed her, thinking all the while. 

She went into the drawing-room and flung her- 
self into her rocking-chair. 

“ Make haste ! ” she exclaimed. “ Send me off! 
I want to see where Rex is ! ” 

Oliver came and stood by her; and showed 
some fruits of his reading. He simply looked at 
her and said, “ Sleep ! ” 

He was rewarded by her almost immediately 
passing into the hypnotic state without any 
trouble. 

“ Do you see Rex ? ” he asked. 

“ Yes,” she answered ; and then she described 
Rex as she saw him, standing in front of the harp- 
shaped gold and white screen, in the morning-room 
of the old Hall, a strange look of embarrassment 
on his face. 

She had hardly described this picture when 


SUGGESTION. 


89 


* 

Oliver heard Sir Charles’s voice speaking to a 
servant in the hall. 

“Where’s Miss Margery? ” 

“ In the drawing-room, sir.” 

Oliver said an ngly word under his breath ; and 
then very emphatically, in Margery’s ear, he said, 

“ You will sleep this afternoon* at five o’clock. 
Now, WAKE ! ” 

She opened her eyes ; looked at him ; started 
from her chair. 

“Order the ponies out!” she exclaimed. “I 
am going to the old Hall, instantly.” 

Sir Charles was already in the room. “ ’Tis too 
soon, Madge,” he said, “ you needn’t go yet. I 
want to speak to you about that woman at the 
lodge.” 

“ Oh, bother the woman at the lodge. Oliver, 
tell them I want the ponies at once. Don’t lose a 
moment or I’ll never forgive you.” 

The two men were left looking at each other. 

“ I swear I can’t make her out,” said Sir Charles. 
“ Madge was never like this ! It’s all that infernal 
brother of yours, I know. Go and order her 


90 


SUGGESTION. 


ponies, there’s a good boy, or else there’ll be a 
worse row.” 

Oliver went off, glad enough to get away at any 
price. 

“ I must get this thing in hand somehow,” he 
said to himself. “It seems to me that circum- 
stances are having the best of it at present, and 
I’m out in the cold.” 

The ponies were ready in double quick time, and 
so was Margery. She drove off without a word to 
anybody. We have seen just how they arrived 
rather too soon for lunch, at the old Hall. 


SUGGESTION. 


91 


CHAPTER VII. 

Margery’s own sitting-room at Hawthorndene 
was a pretty little room at the back of the house 
on the first floor. It was furnished with pink and 
white chintz ; water-colors and photographs cov- 
ered the walls ; there were hanging shelves filled 
with paper-backed novels, and some very easy 
chairs. The only serious article of furniture in 
the room was a writing-table in the window, over 
which the sun streamed for half the day. Mar- 
gery loved sunshine ; and at this table she wrote 
all her letters, her notes of invitation, and kept her 
accounts. 

It was not regarded as a sanctum in any par- 
ticular sense ; anyone walked into it and talked to 
Margery when she was there, or went in for books 
in her absence. It was especially hers only in the 
matter of the writing-table, which no one ever 
used but herself. 


92 


SUGGESTION. 


Thinking about l^argery, and a sort of vague 
feeling that he might pick up some idea from her 
surroundings, led Oliver into this room soon after 
she was gone. 

Whistling, his hands in his pockets, the picture 
of an idle man, he lounged in and looked at the 
books on the shelves. A new French novel caught 
his eye. He took it down and looked at it. It 
did not interest him. He put it back and looked 
round at the writing-table. There something 
caught his eye which interested him at once. A 
nice little roll of crisp banknotes, lying half hidden 
under some other papers. How much was there ? 
He went at once and counted the notes, putting 
them back afterwards just as they were. A hun- 
dred pounds. He walked away downstairs, think- 
ing what a relief it would be to get off to town 
and see what a night of poker would do for him ! 
Why not ? This money wasn’t much, but ’twould 
serve. And again, why not ? If he won he swore 
to himself he would go no further in the exercise 
of his power over Margery. He felt that in that 
case it would be as if a higher power had inter- 


SUGGESTION. 


93 


fered to save him from acts the rightness of which 
appeared so doubtful. If he lost it would make 
no difference. His own position could not be 
worse than it now was ; and his power over Mar- 
gery would he just the same. On the whole it 
was worth doing. It would be a pastime, a dis- 
traction. 

The two men lunched alone together, and Sir 
Charles, who was always uneasy when Margery 
was away from him, asked what time the pony- 
carriage was to go for her. 

“ She did not fix a time,” said Oliver. 

U I think I’ll have out the phaeton and drive 
over for her myself,” said Sir Charles. “ I’m sure 
she is not at all well to-day.” 

This was about three o’clock. Oliver was getting 
very uneasy himself, for he was exceedingly anxious 
that she should be back before five. He had no 
idea what the result of his experiment would be, 
whether she would sleep at the hour he had fixed, 
or no. 

He felt that it would be very necessary for him 
to be on the spot at the time, and still more neces- 


94 


SUGGESTION. 


sary to be alone with her if possible. For he was 
resolved, come what might, to keep his power over 
her a secret between themselves. If Sir Charles 
once got scent of it, all its value to him would be 
gone, and he had not yet even judged its value. 

He wondered what had made him fix five o’clock ; 
but it is a very useless thing to wonder afterwards 
about any action done in a great hurry. He had 
thought, hastily, of the fact that Sir Charles was 
generally out riding at that hour ; and that had 
been a sufficient reason, at the moment, for fix- 
ing it. 

Of course she would be home before five — yet 
who could tell ! He urged Sir Charles to fetch 
her early, saying he had thought her looking very 
ill. This was quite enough to set the old gentle- 
man off in a fume and double quick-time. At the 
last moment Oliver insinuated that he had to a 
certain extent lost his heart to the lovely Ameri- 
can, and was immediately ordered to go also. 
This he was anxious to do ; for it struck him that 
if Sir Charles found Margery all right, he might 
himself yield to the fascination of the lovely 


SUGGESTION. 


95 


American and stay to five o’clock tea. Wliat a fatal 
hour to have fixed ! 

“ I must manage these things better in future,” 
he said to himself. 

However, that was not the immediate question. 
The immediate question was how to make sure of 
this afternoon and its opportunities. 

He knew he could rely on Margery herself for 
getting home before the time when she should sleep, 
if she knew about it. But he had suggested it to 
her while she was in the morbid state, and in all 
probability she knew nothing about it now. 

He got into the carriage with Sir Charles and 
drove off with him. He determined to be on the 
spot and act as best he might. He was a pretty 
fair poker player — not so good as he fancied him- 
self, of course — no one ever is — but good enough 
to have learned some of the valuable lessons of 
that game. 

And thus it was that Hetty Carruthers, sitting 
by the drawing-room fire, and feeling “ awful dull ” 
because her sister-in-law was in the room and she 
was afraid to talk as much as she would like to 


96 


SUGGESTION. 


Margery, was amazed and unaffectedly pleased 
by quite a bevy of good-looking men early in 
the afternoon. 

For Hetty was an admirer of the strong sex, and 
liked old men and young men equally well, so 
long as they were what she would call “ nice.” 

Rex arrived first. She was eaten up with ad- 
miration for him. But she did not dare to talk to 
him, seeing, as she could not but see, at once, that 
he was a favorite with both the others. Margery 
tried to disguise her passion, her jealousy and her 
uneasiness ; but she was unused to concealment, 
and the attempt was a bad one. She could not 
take her eyes off him, try hard though she did to 
rivet them on the fire or turn them to Hetty’s 
beautiful flushed face. She was miserably aware 
of his being imperceptibly and delicately appro- 
priated by Mrs. Carruthers, who caressed him 
with her words and maintained — or so it seemed 
to Margery — a manner which conveyed the idea 
that there was a mysterious understanding between 
them. Rex did not appear to resent this — per- 
haps he was not aware of it — but he was to a 


SUGGESTION. 


97 


certain extent ill at ease, and concealed the fact 
rather badly, as well-bred Englishmen generally do. 

Soon, to Hetty’s surprise, his double appeared ; 
another edition of himself, only better looking. 
For to her mind Oliver was far the handsomer 
man of the two. The two faces had totally dif- 
ferent expressions, and it was Oliver’s which 
pleased her best. But she lost her heart com- 
pletely to Sir Charles, whose breezy manner de- 
lighted her in that drawing-room where everyone 
was always, as it seemed to her, so stiff and arti- 
ficial. 

To her disgust nobody took any notice of her, 
except for a casual glance of admiration at her 
beautiful face. She was not used to playing wall- 
flower in this way, for at home her wild gayety 
made her a great favorite with “ the fellers.” 
The person really to blame for this was Mrs. 
Carruthers, who was rude enough not to introduce 
her. This was a plan she had adopted of late 
when she wanted to make sure that Hetty’s Yan- 
keeisms should not disgrace her. As for the men 
who were present, as it happened, they were all 


98 


SUGGESTION. 


too much occupied with Margery, each for totally 
different reasons from the others, to give more 
than a casual thought to the beautiful silent girl 
who sat by the fire. 

Oliver looked uneasily at his watch now and 
again. The afternoon was slipping away ! At last 
he determined to risk delay no longer. He ap- 
proached Margery and spoke to her in a very low 
voice. She started, and flushed nervously. 

“ At five o’clock ! ” she said, “ what time is it 
now? Oh, I must get home. I’ll tell papa I want 
to go.” 

Mrs. Carruthers was devoting all her attention 
to Rex, apparently; but she was one of those 
people who can see without appearing to see. She 
noted the low-voiced speeches, the start and the 
flush. She was quite convinced now of what she 
had suspected all the afternoon, that there was 
some little mystery among these people which she 
had not yet got to the bottom of. It baffled her, 
and none of the interpretations which rose to her 
mind quite satisfied her intelligence — for in her 
limited way, she was a very shrewd little woman. 


SUGGESTION. 


09 


This did not seem to her to have quite the atmos- 
phere of the ordinary intrigue — a girl engaged 
to one brother and in love with the other — yet 
what else could it be ? 

Just as Margery turned to go hastily to her 
father, Hetty Carruthers’ nasal tones fell on the 
air and silenced all other voices. 

“ What’s your name ? ” 

She addressed herself to Sir Charles, who hap- 
pened to be standing near her, disengaged. Quite 
tired of her enforced solitude she had determined 
to enter into conversation with somebody or other, 
and took this mode of breaking the ice. Sir 
Charles looked at her in amazement for a moment 
and then a twinkle came into his eyes. He replied 
quite gravely. “ Why, my dear young lady, it’s 
so ugly I should he afraid to tell you ; but I’ll ask 
Mrs. Carruthers to.” 

“ Oh, don’t trouble her,” said Hetty, “ it ain’t 
of no account. Most English names seem to me 
awful ugly.” 

She had no opportunity for any further confi- 
dences, as Margery came up at this moment, looking 


100 


SUGGESTION. 


very white ; the flush had died all away again in an 
instant. “ Papa,” she said, “ I want to go home ; 
I’m so tired. Do you mind coming now ? ” 

“ Indeed no ! ” exclaimed Sir Charles, “ not if 
you are tired.” 

“ I’m so sorry,” said Mrs. Carruthers, who was 
biting her lips and looking daggers at Hetty. 
“ I’ll ring for your carriage.” 

Oliver, chiefly to distract attention from Mar- 
gery, and partly for his own amusement, asked 
Mrs. Carruthers to introduce him to Hetty. She 
did so perforce, and then left her unlucky sister- 
in-law to her fate while she returned to Rex and 
tried to interest him again. But he was watching 
Margery, and paid little attention to his hostess’s 
beautiful eyes, and pretty words. She was puzzled 
and disgusted, for she was used to feel her power, 
under all circumstances ; but she had the gift of 
never showing vexation, and her laugh rang just 
as merrily through the room as if it sprang from 
pleasure. 


SUGGESTION. 


101 


Extract from Margery Hawthorn’s Diary. 

“ I must tell someone or something what has 
happened to-night; and there’s no one but my 
diary that I can speak to — that I dare speak to. 
For I am thoroughly frightened. 

“ Oh ! Rex, Rex, do you love that woman ? I be- 
lieve you do ; and in believing this I feel I have 
lost my one only friend in all the world. For 
I don’t trust you, Rex, any longer. Oh, how aw- 
ful it is to write that down ; but it’s true, true ! 
And yet I love you more than ever. What is to 
become of me ! For I want someone to speak to, 
oh, so badly, as I never did in all my life before. 
Even if it would be any good to talk to papa I 
should he afraid to now, because I’m so puzzled. 

“ It is twelve o’clock. I don’t feel as if I should 
ever sleep again, but should sit here always 
by myself, thinking. By myself, thinking ! Oh, 
how dreadful that seemsl But I don’t know what 
else can come. 


102 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Oliver Heriot has gone up to town quite sud- 
denty, by the night train. He told papa he had 
been telegraphed for about his horses. I knew it 
was a lie, but my tongue was tied and I felt I 
must be silent. 

“ The last time I wrote anything in this book was 
on that night when Oliver first made me do some- 
thing without my knowing it. That was only a 
little thing, though it made me very angry. What 
he made me do to-night was serious, not that it 
matters very much ; only it seems to me, if I can 
be made to do a thing like that without knowing 
it, I may be made to do anything — anything ! It 
is a frightful idea. 

“ I had a hundred pounds in notes on my writing- 
table to-day, which I intended to pay away to- 
morrow. After dinner this evening I fetched them 
out of my room, took them into the drawing-room, 
gave them to Oliver, and told him to use them for 
me in London. I did this before papa — and yet I 
did not know that I did it ! 

“ Oliver went off to catch the late train and I went 
back to my room to write some letters — missed the 


SUGGESTION. 


103 


money, had a vague idea that I had carried it 
downstairs — went back to the drawing-room and 
said to papa, ‘ What did I do with that money ? ’ 
‘ What money ? ’ he said. 4 Do you mean the notes 
you gave Oliver ? My dear girl, there’s something 
wrong with you to-day, you’re so forgetful.’ That 
frightened me, and I said no more. I did not know 
what to say. For there certainly was something 
wrong with me ! It was borne into my mind, by 
degrees, like a faded memory gradually being 
restored to life, that I really had given that money 
to Oliver — and without knowing that I did it. 
This seems incredible and yet it’s quite true. I do 
wish I had someone I could talk to about it ! The 
very idea that such a situation is possible frightens 
me. Why, he could make me do anything, ex- 
cept love him — that never — no, that I do not be- 
lieve any person imaginable could do ! I feel I 
hate him when I think of the influence he has over 
me. But I suppose I brought it all on myself. I 
never should have put myself under his influence 
as I did. Yet how could a poor girl help it, who 
was as madly jealous as I was, and knew there was 


104 


SUGGESTION. 


such a wonderful way of finding out the truth ? 
Oh ! Rex, Rex, it is too dreadful to think of. No 
other trouble matters by the side of that ! I feel a 
sort of horrible conviction that you have never 
really cared for me one bit. I suppose she jilted 
you, that lovely little creature, for someone richer. 
Well, she has enough money now ! — I wonder if 
she’s happy — No, ’tis sure she isn’t — she wants my 
Rex again. W ell, how can she help it ? Anyone 
must love Rex — I can’t help loving him the same, 
through everything. How I wish Oliver were 
back again, so that I could see what Rex is doing ! 
I shall never, never dare to tell Rex a word about 
this, all my life ! it would seem so horribly mean 
to have spied upon him as I have. I can’t help 
it — it’s done ! But I wish I’d never done it. I 
should be ever so much happier ! — I should have 
no secret to haunt me all my life ; and if Rex is 
deceiving me I should not know it. It is much 
better to be ignorant and happy. I wish I had the 
will to swear to myself I would never use this 
means to find out anything again. But I can’t — 
I know if I took the vow I should break it. I am 


SUGGESTION. 


105 


no heroine ; I’m only a foolish girl desperately in 
love, desperately jealous. 

“ I don’t think any woman ought to be as pretty 
as she is. It isn’t right, to my mind. And yet, 
how I would love to be as pretty! Then Rex 
would really care for me.” 

Oliver came back on the afternoon of the second 
day, looking rather sullen. He walked into the 
drawing-room at tea-time, and found Sir Charles 
and his daughter together there : Margery sitting 
brooding in her rocking-chair, pretending to read 
a book which she certainly was not paying any at- 
tention to. Oliver asked for some tea, and she 
gave it him. It would have amused or interested 
anyone who understood the whole position to see 
the covert glances with which these two studied 
each other. 

Oliver drank the tea with that unmistakable 
“ breakfast ” air, which even Margery’s unsophis- 
ticated eyes detected. Evidently he had been up 
all night. Evidently he was not in as cheerful a 
humor as when he went away. 

His study of Margery was encouraging to him- 


106 


SUGGESTION. 


self, from his own peculiar point of view at the 
moment. “ Fretting horribly ! ” was his mental 
comment, “ I can do what I like with her. How 
she dislikes me ! That doesn’t matter, though — I 
can soon conquer that.” 

He ensconced himself in a deep arm-chair before 
the fire with just Rex’s manner and in just his 
attitude. This curious physical resemblance to 
his brother was one of Oliver’s characteristics 
which annoyed Margery. For though they had 
always been good friends she had never really 
liked Oliver; and it harassed her to have him 
remind her so often of the man she worshipped. 
To-day in particular it irritated her, for reflection 
over recent incidents had brought not only a dis- 
like but a sort of fear of Oliver into her mind. 

The furtive, uncertain gleam in his eyes seemed 
to her much more noticeable than ever. Once she 
caught him scrutinizing her, and this gleam 
startled and disgusted her. But in spite of her 
disgust she was conscious also that his eyes had a 
power over her. 

Sir Charles was delighted to see him back, for 


SUGGESTION. 


107 


he seriously missed his company when he was 
away. He had vainly tried to interest Margery 
in his usual stable-talk, and now gladly over- 
flowed with it to Oliver. It was not at all necessary 
for the other two, who were both thinking hard, 
to talk, as Sir Charles did it all for them. Oliver 
used his happy knack of appearing to understand 
all that was said to him, while in reality not hear- 
ing a word of it. 

He had spent the previous evening and the 
greater part of the night in some pleasant little 
chambers in St. James’s. A few calls in the day 
had enabled him to gather together enough choice 
spirits to make up a poker party, all of them with 
plenty of money, for Oliver had spent his mother’s 
fortune in excellent company, among men much 
richer than himself. The acquaintance of men 
with plentifully lined pocket-books was all that 
was left to him of his past glories. It was hard to 
go among them with so little in his own pocket ; 
but he had paid the full price for learning to play 
poker, and quite believed that he was skilled 
enough now to gain some of it back again. 


108 


SUGGESTION. 


But before the night was half worn away he 
had lost his nerve and lost all he had. He was 
too nervous then to stop, but went on playing, 
just as a drunkard who has had enough must yet go 
on drinking. The consequence was that he left 
behind him several I.O.U.’s. and returned to Haw- 
thorndene somewhat gloomier than he left it. 

“ Shall I marry Margery Hawthorn ? ” he was 
saying to himself as he sat by the fire. “Can 
I marry her if I make up my mind to it ? The 
old boy could set me on my legs again.” 

Sitting there between them he turned it over in 
his mind. 44 Should he ” almost overshadowed 
44 could he.” It was hard to say whether, when 
the prize was won, it would really be worth the 
having. He did not mean Margery herself by the 
prize ; she did not weigh with him in any way ; he 
simply meant her belongings, her money, her posi 
tion. 

44 It’s hateful to think of settling down so soon,” 
he thought to himself, 44 for that’s what it would 
mean. The old boy would look after me like any- 
thing if I belonged to his precious Margery. And 


SUGGESTION. 


109 


belong I should ! — that would be the confounded 
nuisance. The old man would feel he’d bought 
me when he’d paid my debts. To live here 
always — with an affectionate wife and a talkative 
father-in-law. I don’t think I can manage it.” 

He leaned forward at this juncture of thought, 
his elbows on his knees, and stared into the fire. 

Margery looked at him, wondering. If she 
could have read his thoughts ! 

But, though she was a hypnotic subject, she was 
not a thought-reader. 

To the thought-reader, if such a person really 
exists, life ought to be greatly simplified. To the 
hypnotic subject, who certainly does exist, it 
becomes considerably more complicated than to 
other persons. 

Margery would have been horrified indeed if she 
had been able to read Oliver’s thoughts ; but she 
would have been saved a world of trouble later 
on. 

However, as fate would have it, she did not 
possess this faculty. 

“ You don’t look as if you’d been to bed last 


110 


SUGGESTION. 


night,” said Sir Charles, noticing Oliver’s mood at 
last ; “ and dear me, now I think of it, you seem 
uncommonly fagged. Cards again, sir? Well, 
well ! It’s no use, I know ; it’s in your very blood. 
Did you execute Margery’s commissions ? You’re 
not the kind of young man I should intrust a 
hundred pounds to,” he added playfully ; offering 
for Oliver’s consideration an illustration of truth 
being spoken in jest. 

“ Oh, yes,” said Oliver throwing himself back in 
his chair. “ I executed them all right. I’ll give 
you the accounts directly,” he said to her. 

Margery bowed her head — not really in answer, 
though it passed very well for a sign of assent. 
She looked at her hands, which, clenched over the 
arms of her chair moved to and fro ceaselessly and 
would have told all about her mental irritation to 
a shrewd observer. But she was always restless, 
and her father thought nothing about it except that 
she was not as well as usual. 

He still attributed this to a lovers’ quarrel. Rex 
had not been over to-day at all ; a very unusual 
circumstance. What had passed between them 


SUGGESTION. 


Ill 


yesterday? He had asked Margery the question 
and she said “Nothing — nothing unusual at all.” 
Yet she had not spoken with conviction, because 
she knew in her heart that she had foolishly let 
Rex see she was jealous of Mrs. Carruthers, and 
then had got angry with him because he had 
simply laughed. The laugh had not pleased her 
— there was something in its tone which she had 
not understood — and which she interpreted to mean 
annoyance — as it did, only not of the kind she 
imagined. 

Yes, thought-reading would make life much 
easier for most of us, though no doubt it would be 
very inconvenient sometimes. 

To a certain extent it exists, of course ; only it 
seems almost impossible to calculate on it. 

Oliver at that moment had a flash of it. He saw, 
almost visibly, the thought in Margery’s mind. 

“ I would give all the money I am ever likely 
to possess just to feel for one hour as if Rex was 
all my own.” 

He gave a quick glance at her ; got up from his 
chair and stood with his back to the fire in the 


112 


SUGGESTION . 


attitude of a man who is suddenly possessed by an 
idea. 

“ It would pay me better to let her marry Rex. 
She hasn’t a notion how much he cares for her ! I 
shall have a full hand if I can keep her under my 
influence. She’ll have the Heriot and the Haw- 
thorn funds both at her command. Rex is such 
a fool I’m* sure to be able to manage him through 
her.” 

“ What villainy are you plotting, Oliver ? ” ex- 
claimed Sir Charles, the most malapropos of men. 
“ You look like the hero of a shilling shocker.” 


SUGGESTION. 


113 


CHAPTER IX. 

There was a kind of lull or calm in the three 
households during the next few days. The kind 
of lull that comes before a great storm. Everyone 
seemed to feel something ominous about it. The 
state really arose from the fact that everyone was 
in a perplexed condition, and unable to confide his 
or her perplexities to any other person. Sir Charles 
did the most talking ; and he simply harped on 
the same theme forever — What was the matter 
with Margery, and who was in fault? He asked 
these questions perpetually of Oliver, who shook 
his head and said nothing. That young man 
thought incessantly ; but kept his thoughts strictly 
to himself. 

The calm was broken by Margery’s dinner-party, 
which brought once more into juxtaposition the 

various elements of the storm. 

8 


114 


SUGGESTION. 


When Margery issued her invitations she had not 
seen Hetty Carruthers, having only paid a formal 
call at the old Hall, on which occasion Hetty was 
carefully suppressed. But Mrs. Carruthers. having 
taken up Margery with so much warmth and 
forced the acquaintance into an informal friend- 
ship, was compelled to bring Hetty on the scene ; 
and so, the day after the lunch at the old Hall, 
an invitation for the dinner-party reached that 
young lady. 

“ How’ll I ever fix myself so’s to stop tidy a 
whole evening?” she asked Mrs. Carruthers in 
despair ; “ and what’ll I do if anybody speaks to 
me and asks me how I like Europe, same as they 
always do, seems to me ? Ain’t there any other 
thing to say to an American gal, that these 
stiff sort of folks must always ask me the same 
question ? And whatever I answer them they seem 
scared, or else they all set to and laugh. I’m sure 
I don’t know what they find to laugh at.” 

“Well, don’t go,” suggested Mrs. Carruthers, 
coldly. 

“ Wal, I don’t know ’bout that,” said Hetty 


SUGGESTION. 


115 


dryly, “ strikes me I’d be duller all by my lone 
here. No, I guess I’ll go, and I’ll try and stay fixed 
just as long as I can.” 

So she wrote her note of acceptance, rather to 
Mrs. Carruthers’ disgust. She was vaguely and 
subtly annoyed by Hetty, beyond and above her 
vexed vanity, whenever the girl’s quaint speech and 
candor provoked a laugh. Another and more 
precious vanity was offended by the idea — which 
she would not have put into words for worlds — 
that Hetty was really very much admired, and 
actually sometimes distracted attention from her- 
self. 

There was yet another lady belonging to the 
old Hall menage , who was invited by Margery, 
though she had never seen her. This was Hetty’s 
great-aunt, who had been pressed into the service 
by Mr. Carruthers when his wife insisted on com- 
ing over to Europe without him, and packed off as 
a chaperon. She was, however, too infirm to be 
anything but a decorative figure when Mrs. 
Carruthers gave an important entertainment. 
The old lady was just what Hetty would have 


116 


SUGGESTION. 


become if left at home in her natural surroundings 
all her life. She was pleased to be dressed up now 
and again in satin and lace and diamonds, glories 
which had only been words to her when she was 
young ; and was willing enough in return to sit up 
for an hour or two in the drawing-room. But she 
was not equal to going out, especially in cold 
weather. So she lay like a queen, or some other 
great personage, in her stately bed, and the two 
young women came dutifully to show themselves 
when they were dressed. She was well content 
with her fate. A cheery, small-minded old maid, 
with narrow interests and a kindly heart, belong- 
ing to the withered-apple type of ancient woman- 
hood. She fully appreciated the luxury and wealth 
that had come to her so late in the day, just so far 
as she could apprehend their possibilities. To tell 
the truth, when she was younger she would have 
cared as little for it as did Hetty. It pleased 
Hetty to be beautifully dressed, of course ; but 
still she felt she paid heavily for the privilege, at 
the cost of having to sit up quietly at a splendid 
dinner-table instead of having a good time after 


SUGGESTION. 


117 


her own heart. She liked a farm-house kitchen 
better than any drawing-room. The old lady’s 
tastes were much the same ; but years had toned 
her down, and she was well content to be waited 
on, and pass her time in marvelling at “little 
Joseph” (as she always called the millionaire,) 
having effected such a miraculous change in the 
fortunes of the family. 

The bed in which old Aunt Hetty lay was an 
historic couch and had been slept in by kings and 
queens ; her coverlet was a wonder of lace and 
needlework. She had ceased puzzling over these 
things ; but still in her heart she thought the great 
oak bedstead a musty sort of affair, not to be com- 
pared to a brightly painted modern construction of 
iron ; and it seemed to her that the lace and needle- 
work would have been more in place on one of the 
drawing-room tables which, to her horror, were un- 
clad and littered always with books and newspapers. 
Her great-nephew’s young wife — such a child to 
look at — so gentle and winning in her ways — was 
adamant in some things ; and the old lady perfectly 
understood, very soon after her chaperonage com- 


118 


SUGGESTION. 


menced, what she might comment on and what she 
might not. 

“ Every blessed thing’s topsy-turvy now,” she 
used to say to Iletty sometimes in moments of 
confidence. “Young gals like Amy used to give 
in to their elders, hut all that’s over and done. 
We ain’t listened to any more ; we’re just figures 
set up to look at. However, ’tain’t no business of 
mine, so long as Joseph’s satisfied. And she is a 
sweet pretty creature I will say, and just as sweet 
in herself, too, as if she was made of honey.” 

“ Good-night, auntie ! ” said Mrs. Carruthers 
affectionately, her face lit by her lovely smile of 
childlike innocence and freshness ; and leaning over 
the bed she pressed her red lips on the old lady’s 
withered check. How her little white teeth sparkled 
between those red lips, and her bright eyes gleamed 
like stars ! A small half-moon of brilliants glittered 
in her closely-braided bronze hair ; but she wore 
no other ornaments, and her dress, which had cost 
some fabulous sum, was a marvel of simplicity, 
sheathing her delicate figure as a glove sheathes the 
hand, and with as little pretension. Hetty, with 


SUGGESTION. 


119 


the vivid, flush on her cheeks and some vivid gera- 
nium petals in her elaborately coiled hair, looked 
like a strong tiger-lily beside this fragile creature. 

“You’re two bonny gals,” said the old lady, 
lost in genuine admiration, “ and fixed real cun- 
ning. I wonder what kind of games ye’ll have 
to-night.” 

“Games, auntie!” laughed Mrs. Carruthers ; 
“ people don’t play games now at grown-up parties.” 

“ Oh, but they do,” put in Hetty rather eagerly. 
“ I heard that nice old Sir Charles talking about 
some queer kind of game, they’d been playing at ; 
I b’lieve he called it 4 willing and wishing ! ’ Seems 
like we used to play with the piano, 4 hot and cold ; ’ 
but you do this one only with thinking ; seemed 
to make me kind o’ scared ; don’t know why.” 

“ Because you’re a silly child,” said Aunt Hetty, 
“ that’s why.” And she looked at this girl who 
was like the re-incarnation of her own youth with 
an admiration Amy could never win from her. 
She did not pretend to understand Amy, who was 
essentially a nineteenth century creature, mys- 
terious, full of worldly and cultured intuitions. 


120 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Well, I don’t know,” said Hetty reflectively, 
“but it strikes me, if there’s anything in that 
willing and wishing, the devil himself must be at 
the back of it.” 

“ Don’t talk so violently, dear Hetty,” said Mrs. 
Carruthers with a frown. “ Come, we must go, or 
we shall be really too late.” 

She swept away downstairs, her aristocratic 
little head held high with an air of conscious rec- 
titude ; and Hetty humbly followed her. 

At Hawthorndene they entered the drawing- 
room like a pair of goddesses, all light and splen- 
dor. The other women seemed small and dowdy 
beside them excepting Margery, who held her own 
magnificently. She was like night, or the genius 
of a storm, with her dark coloring, and her rest- 
less excitability of manner. 

The pick of the county had been asked to meet 
Mrs. Carruthers, and very pleased and proud it 
was to do so. Obscurity of origin is nowadays 
regarded as only natural in a very rich person, 
especially if American, and such trifles are readily 
forgiven in the old country when there is beauty 


SUGGESTION. 


121 


and charm backed by enormous wealth. So it 
was no wonder if Mrs. Carruthers, with her won- 
derful beauty and the reputation of being a million- 
airess, became immediately a favorite. 

The dinner-table talk was not very brilliant, in 
spite of the social eminence of the guests; the 
crops, horses, hunting, and a poor attempt at poli- 
tics being the range of subjects touched upon. 
Mrs. Carruthers talked of the hunting-breakfasts 
and shooting-parties she intended to give at the 
old Hall, which made her conversation appear 
very interesting to the others. A promise of 
pleasure makes talk seem more brilliant than any 
flashes of wit. She announced her intention of 
giving shooting-parties especially for ladies. 

“ You’re a good shot yourself then, Mrs. Car- 
ruthers, I conclude,” said Sir Charles. 

“ Oh, yes,” she said, looking up with her beauti- 
ful smile, “ I’m a dead shot.” 

She had raised her eyes with the accustomed 
practised sweep of the long lashes, intending her 
glance for Sir Charles ; but before it reached him 
it rested on Rex’s face, who sat opposite her. He 


122 


SUGGESTION. 


was looking straight at her, with a most curi- 
ous expression ; he seemed very pale. Her lips 
remained parted and fixed in their smile till it 
grew forced and unnatural ; her eyes remained on 
his face. She conquered herself in a moment, 
and looked down. Rex flushed a little and turned 
rather nervously to speak to his neighbor. He did 
not notice Margery’s studious gaze ; she had 
watched the whole trifling incident ; and it did 
not seem trifling to her. 

If she could have spoken to anyone — above all 
if she could have spoken to Rex — but it was impos- 
sible, she brooded over her own jealous thoughts. 
As for Rex she had lost her confidence in him. 
Yet she loved him even more than when she had 
it. For now she was maddened by the dread of 
losing him altogether. 

Nothing could shake her conviction that he had 
loved Mrs. Carruthers, and that his heart would 
inevitably go back to her. What memories of the 
past evidently existed between them ! To see Rex 
flush and grow nervous like a girl was to her very 
strange. 


SUGGESTION. 


123 


Oliver roused himself that evening, and was in 
an excellent humor ; he shone as the best talker 
at the table. County society did not amuse him, 
but still he liked to shine ; and any society 
amused him better than none. He was essentially 
gregarious and a distraction-lover. Anything that 
pleased or amused him immediately brought out 
his better side and showed him to advantage. A 
good dinner, good wine, pretty and well-dressed 
women, and the sound of his own voice, were 
enough to bring out his charming society manners, 
and he had another stimulant to-night — an occa- 
sional shy, liquid glance from Hetty’s eloquent 
eyes. She was the first woman the beauty of 
whose face had ever interested him, and he was 
distinctly pleased to read her artlessly candid 
admiration for himself in every glance she gave 
him. There is no doubt that to natures like 
Oliver’s, incapable of a sentimental passion, the 
possibilities of feeling are just as strong, though 
they are merely aesthetic and physical. Perhaps 
they are even stronger, being certainly much more 
temporary. To Oliver’s pleasure-loving tempera- 


124 


SUGGESTION. 


ment there was something exciting in Hetty’s 
atmosphere ; in her radiant health, which gave 
her such an Atalanta-like carriage ; in her vig- 
orous vitality, which seemed to impart some of 
itself to those she spoke to or looked at ; in her 
immense and quaint simplicity of manner and 
speech. 

As for Hetty, she had already fallen in love at 
first sight. All the “ nice fellers ” at home, who 
were thinking occasionally of her, were entirely 
forgotten. 

Old Mr. Heriot was not at the dinner. He had 
been asked, of course ; but he had refused because 
he would have had to meet his son Oliver. And 
he was considerably annoyed with Sir Charles 
for having befriended the black sheep. However, 
as he said, that was no affair of his. But nothing 
would induce him to sit at the same table with 
Oliver, or, as he said, to enter Hawthorndene 
while he was there. 

When the men were left alone in the dining- 
room Rex went round to his brother, and under the 
cover of a slightly quarrelsome political discussion 


SUGGESTION . 


125 


among the others, said a few words to him on their 
own affairs. 

“ I can’t get the governor to change his views 
the fraction of an inch,” he said. “ He’s as obstinate 
as a mule. I believe you’ve simply finished the 
game with him. Are you being very much 
pressed ? ” 

“ Confound it all,* yes ! ” said Oliver. “ But 
what’s the good of talking ! I know you can’t 
help me. By the way, do you know anything 
about Carruthers ? ” 

“ About him ? ” repeated Rex with a quick and 
rather suspicious look. 

“ Oh, I mean his money. I suppose it’s real.” 

“ Oh, yes. Carruthers is a big name from New 
York to San Francisco.” 

41 Do you know if that’s his only sister ? ” 

“ I don’t know anything about his family. 
What’s that?” 

It was the sound of a horse galloping furiously 
up the avenue. There was something ominous 
about it. Everyone stopped talking. A moment 
later a servant came into the room and spoke to 


126 


SUGGESTION. 


Rex. Sir Charles started up and went to him. 
The atmosphere of death and dismay was per- 
ceptible instantly. 

Mr. Heriot had had a fit. A doctor was with 
him now. He was not expected to live a quarter 
of an hour. 

Sir Charles went himself to the stables and 
saddled a horse for Rex himself before the groom 
had realized what was wanted. Then came a 
frightfully embarrassing moment, as Rex rode off, 
in his evening dress, just as he was. Should 
Oliver go ? All the men were out in the hall, at 
the open door, and Oliver in the midst of them, 
startled and perplexed. Sir Charles and a groom 
came round with a dog-cart. Sir Charles hurried 
in and put on an overcoat. “ Come, lad,” he said 
to Oliver as he passed him. This decided him. 
He got into the dog-cart and they drove off 
together. 

The ladies were all down in the hall by this 
time ; the low-toned questions and answers were 
chiefly about Oliver, for everyone knew his posi- 
tion. Had he really gone? Well, it was only 


SUGGESTION . 


127 

right. The thought of death so close by quieted 
and hushed the party, as it always does. Wraps and 
cloaks were fetched, the carriages ordered round. 
Margery, looking rather white and nervous, stood 
in the hall to say good-bye to her guests. Hetty, 
acting on the impulse of the moment, gave her a 
warm kiss ; the touch of her flushed, bright face 
was very pleasant to Margery. 

“ Don’t she look pale ? ” said Hetty to her sister- 
in-law as they got into the carriage. 

“ Oh, she’s one of those clever people that can 
look pale at the right time. It’s a very good 
thing for her. She’ll have an immensely rich 
husband now. Of course they’ll get married as 
soon as the mourning’s over. But what on earth 
possessed you to make eyes all the evening at the 
disinherited brother ? It’ll be just like you to go 
and fall in love with some handsome fellow 
without a cent.” 


128 


SUGGESTION. 


CHAPTER X. 

Mu. Heriot was dead when Rex reached the 
house, quick though he was ; so there was no 
chance of any reconciliation with Oliver. 

Rex was at once the richest man in the county, 
and one of the richest in England ; while Oliver 
remained one of the very poorest, his possessions 
being all on the wrong side — debts. 

He was frightfully embittered by the way 
things had fallen out. He began to cherish the 
idea so beloved by unfortunate men, that fate had 
a spite against him. 

He was convinced that if he could have seen 
his father before his death he would never have 
been left absolutely penniless. It was too unjust ! 

But it had happened. These incredible things, 
which it seems never could happen to ourselves, 
do occur, and we have to face them. 

Oliver’s creditors, far and wide, learned the 


SUGGESTION. 


129 


facts of the situation immediately by that occult 
process common to creditors, and which seems to 
have all the necessary mysteriousness of a psycho- 
logical miracle about it. 

Of course these gentlemen had always been 
under the impression that the two brothers would 
be left equal shares in their father’s great fortune. 
Oliver had wandered through Europe with plenty 
of money to spend, and with the reputation of 
great expectations. What joy is possible under 
such circumstances ! In fact, he had his day — a 
day, at all events. But, with the quick blood of 
youth still in him and a passion for pleasure, he 
felt that he wanted not only another day, but 
many another. In the meantime his existence 
vcas distinctly unpleasant, and he began to acquire 
the furtive and uneasy feeling of a man who is 
always liable to meet someone he does not want 
to see as soon as he goes outside the house-door. 

It is a curious fact that men who feel very 

fairly generous when they are comparatively poor, 

alter strangely in this respect if they become very 

rich. This is one of the odd changes produced 
9 


130 


SUGGESTION . 


by wealth and its “ responsibilities.” Rex did not 
seem at all anxious to alleviate his brother’s dis- 
comforts, now that everything was in his hands. 
His father’s cloak appeared to have descended on 
him in more ways than one. With the authority 
of possessions there seemed to have come to him 
the dislike for seeing possessions squandered. 
The solidity of the man of property had come 
upon him, and Oliver found him as hard to deal 
with as he had ever found his father. That was 
how Oliver looked at it. He ignored, or was 
unable to apprehend, that his brother was in love ; 
that he was able now to give a princely fortune to 
the girl he loved — a fortune which had been left 
him freely. While his father lived he had tried to 
intercede for Oliver; but now he asked himself 
why he should take anything away from Margery 
and her possible children for a hopeless spend- 
thrift, whose only use for a fortune was to gamble 
it away ? And Oliver did not know of one circum- 
stance which influenced Rex more than anything 
else. His father had preserved letters and papers 
which Oliver thought were destroyed ; they 


SUGGESTION . 


181 

showed him to be not only a gambler, but a cheat. 
Rex had found them, and they had disgusted 
him as profoundly as they had his father. So 
matters remained in a very uncomfortable state. 
Mr. Heriot’s sudden death cast a gloom over the 
neighboring society, and there were no dinners or 
dances given for a while. Mrs. Carruthers, who 
disliked anything disagreeable, found this state of 
things too dull, and carried off Hetty and her aunt 
to Brighton, where the two beautiful Americans 
and their wonderful toilettes were a ceaseless 
source of delight to the promenaders. Two 
months dragged by dully. Oliver passed most 
of his time cursing his fate. He had no plan 
evolved with which to improve it. He had no 
money with which to follow Hetty to Brighton, 
and moreover he preferred to remain near Mar- 
gery and retain his hold upon her. With Mrs. 
Carruthers' absence Margery’s object in putting 
herself under his influence was gone ; and she 
seemed to forget that she had ever done so. She 
was happier than she had been for a long while. 
Rex was constantly with her and was making all 


132 


SUGGESTION. 


the plans and arrangements for their marriage 
to take place as soon as possible. Sometimes she 
fancied she must have been mistaken about Mrs. 
Carruthers, her happiness seemed so near, and 
Rex so well content. So that this time, which 
was very dull to Oliver, was an almost glad one 
for Margery ; perhaps the gladdest she was ever 
to know, now the first early freshness and com- 
plete confidence of her love was over. That is a 
joy which can never be restored — a joy possible 
only to youth and inexperience. 

Oliver tried experiments upon Margery at inter- 
vals, anxiously testing whether he could influence 
her without her wishing it. He found his power 
over her was complete. It appeared as though 
she had given her will over to him in her jealous 
despair, and yet to be unaware that she had done 
so. He found he could make her do small things, 
such as moving from one part of the room to an- 
other, or changing her chair, without her connect- 
ing the movement in any way whatever with him ; 
and it always seemed to him that she forgot the 
action as soon as it was done, and seemed sur- 


SUGGESTION. 


133 


prised to find herself in a new place. He was 
afraid to test this lest she should suspect him ; for 
he knew very w T ell that she disliked and distrusted 
him, and would never put herself in his power 
without an overpowering reason. But she had 
done this, once and for all ! 

One evening he made her go through quite 
a series of experiments, until at last Sir Charles 
said to her, “ My dear child, how restless you 
are ! ” 

u Am I ? ” she said, apparently quite oblivious 
of the fact that she had not stayed in one place 
for more than a quarter of an hour since dinner 
was over. 

He decided on making a crucial test. “ Take 
that flower from your dress,” he said to her men- 
tally, “ and bring it to me. Say to me 4 keep it — 
I’ve a fancy you should.’ ” 

He had been a long ride over the farms that day 
and had professed to be very tired in order to keep 
Sir Charles from talking to him. He was loung- 
ing in a great arm-chair by the fire, with a book 
open on his knees, and his eyes shut. 


134 


SUGGESTION. 


A moment later and he felt something on his 
hand. 

44 Keep it,” said Margery’s voice, “ I’ve a fancy 
you should.” 

His heart beat fast at this proof of his power. 
He kept his eyes shut and shammed sleep. 

“ Well, upon my word, Madge! ” he heard Sir 
Charles exclaim, with a great roar of laughter. 
44 You are grown very mysterious and sentimental. 
But what’s the use of giving stephanotis to a man 
that’s asleep ! Merciful powers, but the boys now 
are dull dogs ! Fancy a girl giving me flowers 
when I was his age and my sleeping through it ! 
Not exactly. Shall I wake him up ? ” 

Margery was standing on the hearthrug, her 
hand at her forehead. When her father advanced 
towards Oliver with the evident intention of mov- 
ing him to a sense of his luck, she put out her 
hand and stopped him. 

44 Don’t, father ! ” she said, 44 1 can’t think why I 
did it ! ” 

She snatched the spray of stephanotis from 
where it lay on Oliver’s hand, and flung it into 


SUGGESTION. 


136 


the red-hot fire. There the poor frail thing was 
consumed in an instant, as some poor frail souls 
are by the furnace of this world. 

“My dear little girl,” said Sir Charles, “you 
are very odd and capricious. I declare I shall be 
glad when you are married.” 

“ And so shall I, papa ! ” said Margery, with a 
strange long sigh that had something of the un- 
utterable Lady Macbeth weariness in it. 

All this while Oliver was apparently sound 
asleep. He did not move for an hour at least. 
But his brain was at work. 


136 


SUGGESTION . 


CHAPTER XI. 

It was Christmas Eve; mild and muggy of 
course, as it always is nowadays. How the climate 
of England has altered since Dickens worked ! It 
is to be hoped that future historians of the world 
and its experiences will look to fiction for some of 
their facts, not only about human nature but also 
about the globe on which that same human nature 
has its trivial joy. Fiction writers are strangely 
accurate, simply because they have no creed, no 
cause, no object to serve by perversion of the truth 
or even the glossing of it over. They record that 
which they see, as effectively as they may. 

It was very mild and very muggy. Rex Heriot 
sat alone in his father’s sanctum, at a table covered 
with papers and blue documents tied with pink 
tape. Such is the fate of the propertied man who 
has a conscience. 

He was tired of it, and bored. For he was just 
as pleasure-loving as his brother Oliver, only he 


SUGGESTION. 


137 


had a different kind of conscience. The house 
was dull, and this room was just as good as any 
other. When would Margery be here, with her 
brightness and her gay charm which would trans- 
form all things for him ? and the baby footsteps 
that might come later ? and all the glow and cheer- 
fulness of home life dear to the Englishman ? 

The house was there, and the money : everything 
but the mysterious charm itself. And that was 
all contained in Margery. 

Well, he must wait a little while. Meantime, 
could he give her any pleasure, do anything for her ? 

He looked round the room. Suddenly he started 
to his feet, took up a great bunch of keys and 
hastily looked them over. 

It was so long since there had been anyone to 
wear them that he had forgotten the Heriot jewels. 
They were all locked in a safe in the wall in this 
room. What a Christmas gift for Margery the 
brilliants would be ! White Indian diamonds, of 
grand size. He dimly remembered his mother 
wearing them once, when he was a little boy, not 
long before her early death. 


138 


SUGGESTION. 


He soon had the safe open and dragged out the 
various trays and drawers, sweeping the papers on 
his table back in order to place them there. He 
opened and shut the cases quickly till he came to 
the diamonds. Madge might look the others over 
when she liked — they were all hers to do what she 
chose with and amuse herself with. But the 
diamonds were a gift any man would be proud to 
make to his bride ; they were of enormous value 
and very beautiful. 

There they lay, gleaming and glorious, white 
and ghost-like. 

He would take them to her to-morrow morning. 

The idea that they would give her pleasure sent 
him to his solitary dinner in a quite cheerful spirit. 

He knew it would surprise her for him to come 
in the morning ; all the better. He would drive 
over and go to church with them. So thinking 
he smoked his pipe and plunged into a novel. He 
had found an excuse for going to see Margery 
earlier than he was expected ; quite a sufficient 
reason for feeling better. 

So, the next morning, carrying a rather shabby 


SUGGESTION . 


139 


red leather case, rather too big to go into a pocket, 
Rex was ushered into the Hawthorndene break- 
fast-room, where Margery, ready dressed for 
church, was pouring out tea for the lazy members 
of this easy-going household. Everyone was late, 
and seemed rather proud of it than otherwise. 

Rex accepted a cup of tea, sat down at the table, 
and for a little while enjoyed the glances of curiosity 
directed at the shabby case, which he placed on 
the table in front of him. 

“ Don’t you remember it ? ” he said to Oliver. 
“ Then your memory is not much better than mine. 
I declare, till last night, when I was wishing I 
had a Christmas present to bring Margery, my 
mother’s diamonds had passed out of my mind. 
They’re worth looking at, though ! ” 

So saying, he opened the case and displayed its 
treasures. 

Oliver leaned across and looked at them with 
narrowed, critical eyes. 

“ Yes,” he said quietly, “ you are to be envied, 
Margery. All brilliants and perfect stones. 
Worth a small fortune.” 


140 


SUGGESTION. 


He relapsed into the discussion of tea and kid- 
neys, and appeared to feel no further interest in 
the stones, which, however excited the liveliest 
admiration in Sir Charles and his daughter. 

And Oliver, sitting quietly at the table, was 
thinking to himself : “ Those were the mother’s ; 
they ought to he mine ; she’d have given them to 
me like a shot if she’d known how I should come 
to want money. And how infernally unjust the 
governor would be ! — that prig Rex coming in for 
everything, and my being left without a single 
farthing. What a shame ! What a burning 
shame ! ” 

He turned it over in his mind, this view of the 
matter, till at last it appeared proven to him, not 
only that the diamonds ought to be his, but that 
they actually were his, and this presentation of 
them to Margery as a Christmas gift some kind of 
masquerade, or a subterfuge of the enemy. It is in 
this light that he now regarded Rex, though he 
did not allow it openly to himself as yet. 

Margery’s eyes were as brilliant as the precious 
stones she carried when she ran upstairs to lock 


SUGGESTION. 


141 


them away in her own jewel-box. 44 He loves me,” 
her heart kept singing, 44 he loves me ! — or he 
would not have come over early like this to bring 
them ! ” And it was of his love she thought ; it 
was the sense of that which made her glad — not, 
as with Marguerite, the jewels themselves. 

Oliver remained at home alone, smoking and 
reading, while Margery walked away to church 
between her father and her lover. She looked 
brilliant. All her jealousy was forgotten, all her 
fears and doubts, and the bitter want of confidence 
which had so hurt her a very little while ago. 
She was so young that this was but natural ; 
for was he not with her ? And had he not brought 
her the most precious things he possessed ? He 
had given them to her as to his wife. Very soon 
she would be his wife, and then all jealousy and 
fear and anxiety would be over forever. 

Alas, poor Margery ! 

Rex came back from church with them, and 
stayed to lunch, and stayed on all day. Everyone 
was in the gayest humor, including Oliver, who 


142 


SUGGESTION. 


seemed to have quite recovered from his silent fit 
of the early morning. 

When Margery went to dress for dinner Rex 
asked her to wear the diamonds. “ I will,” she 
said. 

She dressed herself all in white and then lit up 
her beauty by putting on the jewels. It is ex- 
traordinary how brilliants illumine and bring out 
the beauty of a woman’s face. It seems as if they 
had been created for that special purpose. They 
lend a lustre to her eyes and intensify the coloring 
of her lips and cheeks. 

Margery had never looked so royally handsome 
as she did to-night when she entered the drawing- 
room. The necklace of large single stones had a 
grand pendant that burned like a star on her neck ; 
such a pendant as one sometimes sees in the posses- 
sion of an old family, and seldom indeed in a jew- 
eller’s. Rex uttered an exclamation of delight as 
she walked into the glow of the fire. 

“ How they become you ! ” he said. As she 
stood there, the firelight gleaming on her, a quick 
movement of the head loosened the fastening of 


SUGGESTION. 


143 


the necklace, and it fell into the white wool of the 
hearthrug at her feet. 

Rex started forward, stooped and felt for it. 

“ The clasp is an old one,” he said, examining 
it the thing gleamed like a live snake in his 
hands, — “ it must be attended to, will you put it 
on again ? ” 

“ Try,” she said ; “ perhaps I did not fasten it 
properly.” 

He put it on again for her, and she went down to 
dinner in her glory. But at table the same thing 
happened. One of the quick, bird-like movements 
of her head released the clasp, and the necklace 
slid down into her lap. 

She took it up and laid it on the table in front 
of her. As she raised her eyes she met Oliver’s 
full upon her. 

“ Didn’t you say you were going to town to- 
morrow, Oliver?” she said immediately. “Will 
you take it with you and get the clasp attended to ? ” 

She took it up and handed it to him. His face 
was imperturbable. He held the necklace in his 
hands and looked at it reflectively. 


144 


SUGGESTION. 


“ My mother was proud of this,” he said. 

“ And so is Margery ! ” said Sir Charles. 

“ You’d better take it to Hunter & Roskell,” said 
Rex, “ they had it last, and stones get changed 
sometimes.” 

“ I’ll take care of it,” said Oliver. “ Will you 
give me the case after dinner, Margery, so that I 
can put it away and lock it up till I go, or will 
you keep it till then ? ” 

“ I’ll give you the case,” said Margery ; and 
then spoke of something else. He put the neck- 
lace down on the white cloth, and touched it from 
time to time, looking at the different stones as if 
admiring their beauty or recalling a past which 
they reminded him of. In reality he was apprais- 
ing their value. He believed he knew some- 
thing about diamonds and could not easily be 
deceived in them. And he was about right. He 
could judge of a diamond or a horse with any 
professional expert. It is strange how these great 
sights are apportioned to some men and denied to 
others. He was the only person at the table who 
really knew the value of that necklace. 


SUGGESTION. 


145 


CHAPTER XII. 

A period of pleasure and excitement set in now 
for Margery and for those immediately about her. 
The cloud produced by Mr. Heriot’s death was 
rolling off, and people were beginning to think of 
the coming wedding. Margery began to discuss 
the bride’s-maid question with the young ladies of 
the neighborhood at afternoon tea-time. None 
of these young ladies interested her ; they were all 
very insipid ; still, there were seven of them who 
must be asked unless the fiercest jealousies were 
to be created. 

Margery decided that the seven should be asked ; 
but decided also that her chief bride’s-maid should 
be Hetty Carruthers, whether this preference 
created heart-burnings or no. She had never 
liked a girl yet as she liked Hetty. In fact she 
appreciated force of character and genuineness — 
not very common qualities in young Englishwomen. 


148 


SUGGESTION. 


She felt that Hetty possessed them, and even now, 
when Rex had almost made her forget her awful 
jealousy by his present devotion, yet she felt a 
longing to have this fresh, true-faced girl near 
her. Determined not to deny herself this pleasure, 
she wrote to Hetty at Brighton about it. 

Hetty replied by return of post, accepting with 
delight. In a postscript to her quaint little letter 
she mentioned the fact that “ Mr. Heriot ” was in 
Brighton, and had just been to call. 

“ She must mean Oliver ! ” exclaimed Margery. 
“ Then that's why he’s never been back since he 
went to town ! ” 

“ I thought he was sweet on her,” said Sir Charles, 
“ and it shows his good sense. The Heriots have 
a very pretty taste in young women, I must say. 
At the same time I don’t understand my steward 
running ahout the country in this style without 
my permission. I’m afraid he’s a hopeless young 
scapegrace, and I must just give him notice.” 

“ Well, I cannot imagine what use he can be 
to you, papa, I confess,” said Margery, who was 
very fairly practical-minded. 


SUGGESTION. 


147 


“ Oh, well, he has been, and he can be, if he 
will. And it’s so confoundedly dull after dinner. 
What I’m to do when you’re gone, I can’t think. 
Oliver must stop with me, however useless he is. 
And I must make the lazy dog work, that’s all.” 

This, however, was easier said than done. 
Oliver had some friends down at Brighton who 
invited him. His nights were spent at cards ; his 
mornings in bed ; his afternoons with Hetty. Mrs. 
Carru tliers disapproved of him distinctly as a suitor 
for Hetty, for she knew very well that he was 
entirely penniless, and she had heard of his reputa- 
tion as a gambler. This last accounted, to her 
mind, for his apparent affluence of the moment. 
He had dropped back into his old habits of living 
as if he had limitless gold mines to coin money 
from. Having seen many of the ups and downs 
of life, and knowing better than she would have 
cared to acknowledge now what the “ down ” side 
of it is like, she concluded that he had been win- 
ning money at cards and was now spending it in 
the endeavor to dazzle and fascinate Hetty. As for 
Hetty herself there was no use in talking to her on 


148 


SUGGESTION. 


tlie subject. She had given her heart away and 
could not take it back. She was of the type that 
loves once. There are not very many women, 
perhaps, of this type, but there are a very great 
many more than men think. They love not only 
once and for all, but entirely ; the very faults of 
those they love are dear to them. These are the 
generous souls of the world, sorely to be pitied 
when they are flung into the actual struggle of 
life — as all are, sooner or later. 

Hetty was as happy as she could be, in these 
bright cold days at Brighton. She looked ex- 
quisitely lovely in her excitement and happiness. 
Oliver was unremitting in his attentions, and there 
was no mistaking their meaning. But one day it 
all came suddenly to an end, died without either 
warning or explanation. He was not on the prom- 
enade — he did not call — the next day the same. 
Mrs. Carruthers said nothing about it to Hetty, 
but her curiosity was very much a roused, and at 
last she managed to make some adroit inquiries of 
a man who was a slight acquaintance of Oliver’s. 
She soon learned that he had spent the first day on 


SUGGESTION. 


149 


which they missed him over a card-table in a 
room in which the blinds remained down and the 
gas lit for forty-eight hours. The fever had seized 
him, and so long as the other players would sit at 
the table he would not leave it. When he did, 
it was to go straight to the station and take the 
train. “For,” as his friend explained, “ he was 
regularly cleaned out — couldn’t pay his hotel bill 
— and they say he left some tidy I.O.U.’s behind 
him. He’s a perfect devil when the fit’s on him— 
would stake his soul if it were worth anything.” 

Mrs. Carruthers pondered these things in her 
mind, but said very little. She decided to speak to 
Rex when she got back home, and if she could not 
settle the matter with his aid, to send for her 
husband. This last may be considered the great- 
est act of self-sacrifice possible to an American 
woman who is having a good time in Europe ; so 
that it is evident that somewhere in Mrs. Car- 
ruthers’ mental machinery she kept a conscience. 
So she did. She did not regard it as in any sense 
her duty to live all the year round with her 
husband, to keep his house for him or order his 


150 


SUGGESTION. 


dinners ; but she did consider it a positive duty to 
see that, while under her wing, his sister did not 
marry a spendthrift and gambler. “ Whatever 
would Joe say to me ! ” was constantly in her 
mind just now. And she shortened the stay at 
Brighton, in order to get back and see what she could 
do in the matter herself, before proceeding to the 
extreme measure of sending for Mr. Carruthers. 

Hetty was quite delighted to go home, for she 
was very sure that Oliver had gone back to Haw- 
thorndene ; and in this she was quite right. 

He arrived there late in the afternoon, and en- 
tered the house in the furtive manner which came 
upon him sometimes ; a manner which is instinc- 
tively assumed by people who don’t wish to be 
questioned, and which develops by subtle stages 
into the rapid glance round, on entering a room, 
and the covert glance back when in the street which 
characterize the man who has definitely sunk into 
the shady side of life. 

Oliver felt like a man just risen out of a fever, 
and wanted to recover himself a little before he met 
Sir Charles or Margery. So he went straight to 


SUGGESTION . 


151 


his own room and there rang for brandy. A plen- 
tiful supply of this tonic stopped the shaking of 
his hands in a little while ; and after an elaborate 
toilette he looked in the glass and saw once more 
the handsome Oliver Heriot he was accustomed to 
see reflected there. 

Sufficiently restored for this, he was also suffi- 
ciently restored to feel disgust with himself and 
some pricks of conscience, which were a good deal 
sharper than he liked. His disposition was one 
which involved attacks of conscience which came 
in their regular course, like neuralgia or recurrent 
fever. He would go through a definite line of 
reasoning about some unjustifiable action, in this 
way : he would see it as an opportunity ; he would 
feel a profound confidence that if he took the op- 
portunity he would be successful and fortunate, 
and be able to get everything right again immedi- 
ately, so that no wrong would have been done. 
His conscience peacefully slept all this while and 
let him go on rejoicing ; but when, later, he found 
himself unsuccessful and unfortunate and unable 
to get things right, then it woke up and gave him 


152 


SUGGESTION. 


stabs that were as sharp as if given by a dagger. 

Why had he not repaid Margery the hundred 
pounds he owed her while he had plenty of money; 
it would have looked so much better to have done 
it. He was horribly annoyed with himself for not 
having done this while he could, so as to have 
given himself a gentlemanly and honest feeling, 
however superficial it might be, and it was a bad 
stroke of policy, too, not to have done it, for it 
would have given her more confidence in him. And 
he knew he had lost that, when she was in her 
normal state, although he could control her abnor- 
mal self. 

He went into the drawing-room just before din- 
ner, and found Margery there, with Rex, and Sir 
Charles. She was dressed in black, and looked 
wonderfully handsome, with the Heriot diamonds 
gleaming in her hair and on her neck. 

“ Have they done the clasp properly ? ” asked 
Oliver. 

44 Yes, it seems quite strong now. I am wearing 
the necklace to test it, but I think it is quite safe. 
What a long time they kept it.” 


SUGGESTION. 


153 


“ Did they ? ” said Oliver indifferently ; “ when 
did it come ? ” 

“ Yesterday only. A man brought it down in 
the afternoon.” 

“ I believe they had to make an entirely new 
clasp ; they said something of the kind,” replied 
Oliver. 

“ You took it to some place I don’t know,” said 
Rex. “ I hope none of the stones have been 
changed! They do such rascally things some- 
times.” 

“ Oh, dear no,” said Oliver, with a laugh. 
“ That man’s the biggest swell out.” 

Dinner interrupted this conversation. Oliver 
became very silent for a while ; but he drank much 
more wine than usual, and at last it had its effect 
on him and he succeeded in talking to Sir Charles 
with some animation. These two were left to a 
tete-a-tete after dinner, the lovers going off to the 
drawing-room together. 

“ It’s been confoundedly dull while you’ve been 
away,” said Sir Charles with a sigh ; “ you mustn’t 
leave me in the lurch like that just now. It’s an 


154 


SUGGESTION. 


awful thing to play a bad third all the time. Still 
I like to see my little girl look happy and like 
herself again. What will you drink ?” 

Oliver went to the side-board and fetched the 
brandy decanter. 


Extract from Margery Hawthorn’s Diary. 

“ I have been so happy, and now it all seems 
dashed to the ground — all my happiness at once. 

“ I notice that I never open this book or write a 
word in it except when I am too miserable to speak 
to anyone. 

“ If I live to be an old woman it will be strange 
to look back through it and read of nothing but 
the most wretched days of the past. 

“ If I live to be an old woman ! What a strange 
thought. If I do, will it be as Rex’s wife ? What 
a strange question, when we are to be married in 
three weeks exactly. 

“But what may not happen in three weeks? 
What may I not learn in that time ? 


SUGGESTION. 


155 


“ To-day I rode over to Heriot House with papa, 
to look at some alterations in the grounds Rex is 
having made. W e were all on horseback together 
in the park, discussing the question of what trees 
had to be cut down, or rather Rex and papa were 
discussing that, while I was opposing any trees 
being cut down at all. I can’t bear to see trees 
cut down till they are quite old. 

“While we were talking a man-servant came 
riding up and gave Rex a note. He read it and 
then excused himself to us and went into the house 
to write an answer. When he came back he said 
nothing about the note. This was all right, of 
course, and I should never have given it another 
moment’s thought if I had not recognized the man’s 
livery. The note was from Mrs. Carruthers. She 
has come back. I was so happy while she was 
away ! 

“ Before we came home papa said to Rex, ‘ I 
suppose we shall see you at dinner to-night ? ’ and 
Rex said no, not to-night, he had an engagement. 

“ I know he is going to dine with Mrs. Car- 
ruthers. Why didn’t he say so, then, simply, as 


156 


SUGGESTION. 


he would have done if he had been going to dine 
at one of the other houses in the neighborhood ? 

“ Oh ! the thought of it is like a hand at my 
throat ! I feel as if I am being strangled, as if I 
am suffocating, dying ! 

“ I can’t write any more now.” 


SUGGESTION. 


157 


CHAPTER XIII. 

It was the day after Oliver’s return when, for 
the first time for a long while, Rex did not dine at 
Hawthorndene. 

Margery did not come into the drawing-room 
till the minute before dinner. Oliver saw at once 
the look on her face which he understood ; a sup- 
pressed look of pain, and a strange glitter in her 
eyes. 

He knew at once that the demon of jealousy 
was in her again. 

Pie only drank two or three glasses of claret at 
dinner. “ I must keep cool,” he said to himself. 

Margery was very silent all dinner-time. Just 
as she rose to go she spoke to Sir Charles. 

“ Papa,” she said, “ you must lend me Oliver 
for half an hour. I won’t keep him away from 
you longer than that. He has been very lazy 
lately, you know ; and so have I. Oliver, do you 


158 


SUGGESTION. 


mind helping me with my accounts ? If I don’t 
get it done to-night I never shall.” 

“ Why, no,” growled Sir Charles. “ When Rex 
is about I don’t believe you do anything.” 

Margery went to the door. She paused a mo- 
ment before going out. Oliver had risen to open 
it for her. 

“ Come up to my sitting-room in a few mo- 
ments,” she said. 

“ I will come,” he answered. 

He went back and sat down at the table, and 
began to talk indifferently of other subjects. He 
looked at his full claret glass and pushed it away. 
He was a drunkard and knew it. As yet the 
stings of memory were not so sharp but that he 
could sometimes resist stimulant and act without 
it. And he knew that his power over Margery 
was the power over will. He felt, rather than 
knew, that wine affected his resolution. 

He distracted Sir Charles’s attention by a couple 
of clever stories which amused him, and left him 
laughing over his wine, while he went upstairs to 
Margery’s sitting-room. This room was seldom or 


SUGGESTION . 


159 


never used in the evening, so the servants did not 
light it up. Margery had lit a pair of candles, and 
had put them on her writing-table. She sat there, 
before some formidable looking account-books. 

When Oliver came in she looked up with an air 
of relief. 

“ I thought papa would come with you,” she 
said. “ And I know the very sight of accounts is 
enough to scare him away. Shut the door ! — and 
come now and send me to sleep. I want to know 
exactly what Rex is doing at this moment, and 
what he does for the next half hour.” 

Oliver thought it best to simply obey her. He 
had no plan of his own formed and he expected by 
obeying her to certainly get some clew as to the 
actual situation. 

And he did. 

Within five minutes Margery was in the draw- 
ing-room of the old Hall. 

Hetty and her old aunt were there; no one 
else. 

Margery seemed to be groping about, looking 
for something ; and she said no word in answer to 


160 


SUGGESTION. 


Oliver s questions— till at last she suddenly ex- 
claimed — 

“ Flowers ! They are in the conservatory, stand- 
ing among the flowers.” 

44 Tell me what they are saying,” said Oliver. 

44 They are talking of you,” said Margery. 

“ Of me ! ” exclaimed Oliver, starting. This 
was quite unexpected. “ Tell me what they say.” 

44 4 Your brother is evidently paying attention to 
Hetty. This is what I wanted to speak to you 
about.’ 

u 4 To Hetty ! Impossible. He is not the man 
to care for any girl.’ 

“ ‘ Why not ? ’ 

“ 4 W ell — I think not. I am not obliged to give 
my reason for saying so, am I ? ’ 

44 4 Yes ; I think you are, since he is serious 
about Hetty, and I am responsible for her.’ 

44 4 You?' 

44 4 Certainly. You know it, if you think a mo- 
ment. We are not in California now; we are in 
England. I am Mrs. Joseph Carruthers, and I 
have Joseph’s sister in my charge.’ 


SUGGESTION . 


161 


“ 4 You would not long be Mrs. Joseph Carruthers 
if 

“‘Excuse me; I intend to do my duty. You 
can see what Hetty Carruthers is. Do you think 
your brother is a man whom Joseph Carruthers 
would approve of as her husband ? ’ 

“ ‘ No ; he is a scoundrel, a gambler and a rake. 
What do you want of me ? ’ 

“ ‘ I want you to put a stop to it, otherwise I must 
send for Mr. Carruthers.’ 

“ ‘ Which you don’t want to do, with me in the 
neighborhood, till you know what my intentions 
are?’ 

“ ‘ I don’t intend to consider myself in this matter. 
Mr. Heriot you are very unjust to me. I am think- 
ing of Hetty. You know very well, if you will be 
cool for a moment, that I have my duty to do to 
her and to Joseph, quite apart from other matters ; 
and we are none of us bad all through, you know. 
I intend to do that duty.’ 

“ ‘Yes, I believe you will. You are just one of 
those women that are such an odd mixture ! But 
I suppose no one is bad all through. I suppose 


162 


SUGGESTION. 


Oliver isn’t, though sometimes I think he must 
be. Of course he doesn’t care for Hetty ; she may 
please him, but it’s her money he really cares for.’ 
44 4 She will be enormously rich.’ 

“ 4 She shall not be sacrificed to him then, if I 
can help it. I know more about him than I did 
while my father lived, since I have had access to 
all his papers. Oliver shall never have a penny 
from me, if he is starving, and he shall never 
marry any decent woman if I can prevent it, let 
alone a lovely girl like Miss Carruthers.’ 

44 4 Now I know I can rely upon you. Oh, if you 
would only forget the past; a chivalrous, gen- 
erous nature like yours should do so. Can you 
not feel some little friendship for me ? — appreciate 
to some extent the struggle I am making ? We 
must go back into the drawing-room or the others 
will think it so curious. But do think more 
kindly of me, Mr. Heriot. ’ ” 

Margery ceased speaking, and sat still as a 
statue. Oliver stood by her, almost motionless 
too, but palpitating with conflicting emotion, of 
which rage was the strongest. 


SUGGESTION. 


1G3 


Presently a cold devil seemed to enter him. 
He looked down at Margery’s face, and spoke to 
himself. 

“ 4 She shall marry him, and kill him for me, and 
I will step into his place. I’ll take everything he 
has, even Margery herself ! I hate him — listen ! ” 
He bent over Margery. 

“ They are old lovers and they were talking of 
this love. Yon have not heard them speak of 
anything else. Wake ! ” 


, \ 

164 SUGGESTION. 


CHAPTER XIII. 

“ They are old lovers and they were talking of 
their love ! ” 

He had blotted everything else out of her mind, 
hut had left this sentence to burn there. It seemed 
to he written within her in letters of flame, scorch- 
ing her brain and racking her heart. 

She gave him a strange, wild look when her eyes 
opened. 

“ If that’s true ! ” she said, “ I won’t marry him.” 

Oliver was startled. Had he gone too far ? It 
was such an impetuous creature, this. 

“Oh, you must,” he said, without staying to 
calculate his answer. “ Don’t let her take him from 
you ! You are much stronger than she is, because, 
however much she cared for him, she preferred 
another man.” 


“ Only for money,” answered Margery. 


SUGGESTION. 


165 


44 Well, you know how far such a sentiment as 
that would go with a Quixotic fellow like Rex. 
Do you really care for him? ” 

44 Do I care ! ” 

44 Don’t throw him away then. Keep him. She 
can never take him from you while you care for 
him.” 

He was experimenting in this conversation. He 
did not know whether he really had any influence 
over her when in her normal state. He had never 
tried to talk her into any given view of a subject. 
But he saw very quickly that he could do almost 
anything with her ; that her mind was practically 
swayed by his. This was only natural, considering 
how complete his control over her was in the 
hypnotic state. She did not seem inclined to an- 
swer or oppose anything he said, but to absorb and 
dwell upon the idea suggested by him. This was 
what he wanted. He was afraid of saying too 
much, for she seemed in such an easily influenced 
humor, and he had learned that at such times it was 
very possible to overshoot the mark. He suggested 
that it would be as well to go down to the drawing- 


166 


SUGGESTION. 


room, or else Sir Charles would be coming up to 
look for them. 

“ Yes,” said Margery wearily, “ we had better 

go.” 

She rose and led the way downstairs. In the 
drawing-room she sank into her accustomed chair 
and began to rock herself restlessly to and fro. Sir 
Charles had been studying the evening papers, and 
immediately began to read something which amused 
him, aloud to Oliver. This absorbed his attention, 
and he did not notice Margery’s downcast looks at 
the moment. This was a relief to both the others, 
who were equally anxious to keep Sir Charles in 
ignorance of the real events going on around him, 
and indeed he was. How little we know of each 
other’s lives — even of those we are nearest to, and 
who are dearest to us ! 

Oliver, studying her face from time to time, con- 
cluded that he had really gone too far, and deter- 
mined to take the first opportunity of lightening the 
load he had left on her. It would not suit him now 
for her to throw Rex over. He had resolved that 
he would use her as his tool in the best way possible, 


SUGGESTION. 


167 


and he believed she would be of more use to him as 
his brother’s wife than in any other capacity. There 
was little use in remaining in the drawing-room 
with these two while Sir Charles simply read aloud 
the newspaper ; and Oliver wanted to think coolly. 
So he got up and lit a cigar and went out to smoke 
it on the terrace. 

“ Papa,” said Margery, the minute they were 
alone — deliberately interrupting him- in the middle 
of a sentence — “ I want to speak to you. Listen to 
me. I have been wanting to speak to you for ever 
so long ; now my mind is made up. Put that paper 
down and listen to me.” 

“ My dear child, I am listening. But what on 
earth is the matter ? Are you in trouble ? ” 

Margery got up and began to walk about the 
room. 

“ I don’t want to be married yet ! ” she exclaimed 
passionately. “ I don’t feel sure of Rex ; I think 
I’m too young to be married.” 

“ A lovers’ quarrel,” said Sir Charles, rubbing 
up his hair ruefully. “ I thought so. Come, my 
dear, Rex is one of the best fellows in the world. 


168 


SUGGESTION. 


How has he put you out ? He can’t have meant 
it, I’m sure of that.” 

“ Oh, no,” said Margery, in the most utterly 
despondent tone of voice ; still walking restlessly 
about and flinging her hands to and fro with an 
excitable action peculiar to her. 

44 Well, well, if he didn’t mean it, dear child — 
Boys will he boys, you know — what has he done ? ” 

44 That’s not the point,” said Margery impatiently. 
44 How can I go into that ? I want you to help 
me.” 

44 As if you couldn’t rely on your old governor ! 
You know I’m your slave, child. I’ve been mis- 
erable about you lately. But we old folks all 
know what lovers’ quarrels are, and that they have 
to be put up with. You take things too seriously, 
my dear. Of course you can’t help it — young 
people always do. But now tell me the whole 
truth about the matter. It’s only some trifle, I’m 
sure ; I’ve no doubt I can set it all right in a trice 
if you’ll tell me about it.” 

44 No, I can’t do that,” exclaimed Margery ex- 
citedly, 44 I can’t do that ! But I want you to 


SUGGESTION. 


169 


find some excuse for me to put off the marriage.” 

“ Are you jealous of him, then ? ” said Sir 
Charles, resolving at last to exhibit the great 
penetration and tact on which he prided himself. 
“ Is it that pretty American girl, with the Yankee 
twang ? Don’t be foolish, Madge ; he don’t care 
a button about her. I know it’s almost impossible 
to take one’s eyes off her, she’s such a beauty ; 
but, by Jove, the moment she opens her mouth any 
man would sheer off.” 

44 What, Hetty ! ” exclaimed Margery. 44 What 
are you talking about, papa ? I never said I was 
jealous. I say I want to put the marriage off.” 

44 Well, there can be only one reason for that,” 
said this intelligent old gentleman, 44 and that’s 
jealousy. Don’t be hasty, my dear. Rex is 
an honest fellow, and if he fancied another girl 
more than you he’d own up to it, I’m certain. 
He’s not such a fool as to marry you unless he 
loves you.” 

44 Honest ! ” echoed Margery, in a low voice, 
but with a world of meaning in the way she uttered 
the word. 


170 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Yes, child, honest, and you’ve no right to 
insinuate anything else unless you’re quite cer- 
tain ; ” said Sir Charles hotly. “ And it’s a hard 
matter for a girl like you, who knows nothing 
of the world, to be certain, let me tell you.” 

“ I am certain,” said Margery passionately ; “ I 
have means of knowing that you can’t guess at, 
even. I tell you I will not marry him ! I will 
not ! ” 

She spoke in sudden passion, as if any semblance 
of a calm discussion of the subject was no longer 
possible to her. She was standing in the middle 
of the room, her hand on the back of a chair. 

As she spoke, Oliver pushed open the door and 
entered. He had heard her voice raised, and 
hurried in. Her last words fell on his ears like a 
pistol shot. He stood still and gazed at her. In 
a second he realized that this was the effect of his 
own words, which were still burning in her brain. 
Could he arrest this thought in its progress, before 
it became translated into action ? His movement 
of the door had attracted her attention, and she 
looked up at him. He caught her gaze and held 


SUGGESTION. 


171 


her eyes with his. Raising his right hand and 
flinging it out towards her, he ejaculated the word 
“ sleep ” under his breath, but with as much force 
as if he had spoken aloud. Her eyelids quivered — 
her eyes lost their hold — and the lids drooped. 
She swayed slightly to and fro. 

“ She is fainting ! ” cried out Sir Charles, who, 
during this moment, had been simply gazing at 
her, lost in amazement at her last words. He 
rushed to her and took her in his arms. 

“ Poor little girl,” he said tenderly ; “ she is 
altogether over-excited. What can have upset 
her so ? I’ll be glad when she’s married ! ” 

He let her sink into the chair by which she had 
been standing. She was not fainting, but she was 
evidently unconscious, and her eyelids drooped 
heavily on her cheeks. A strange look came on 
her face as of one who sees a vision. Oliver came 
and leaned over her, as she lay back in the chair, 
her head falling a little on one side like that of a 
drooping flower. 

“ What is the matter with her ? ” exclaimed Sir 
Charles in the greatest distress. 


172 


SUGGESTION. 


“ I should get her some brandy,” said Oliver. 
He trusted to Sir Charles’s distress to prevent it 
being noticed that he did not offer to fetch the 
brandy, and to the old man’s quick impulsiveness 
to make him go for it himself. He was quite right 
in his calculations. Sir Charles rushed off instantly 
to the dining-room. 

Oliver stooped over Margery and breathed on 
her forehead, then he stood upright and placed the 
tips of the fingers of his right hand just in the 
middle of her brow. 

“ You will marry Rex,” he said ; “ whatever 
happens to make you uneasy ; nevertheless you 
will marry him as soon as he wishes.” 

There was a second’s pause and then she slowly 
repeated his words. 

“ I shall marry Rex,” she said in a tone as if she 
were learning a lesson by note, “whatever hap- 
pens to make me uneasy ; nevertheless I shall 
marry him as soon as he wishes.” 

“ Wake ! ” said Oliver, and made a few upward 
passes over her face and forehead. Sir Charles 
was returning, and Oliver watched her anxiously. 


SUGGESTION. 


173 


She opened her eyes, quiveringly, and closed them 
again ; then opened them wide. Sir Charles was 
in the room now, carrying a glass. 

“ Have I fainted ? ” she said, looking from one 
to the other. “ Surely I haven’t fainted ? I must 
have been asleep.” 

“You’ve been very queer, my poor child,” said 
Sir Charles ; “ drink this off, and you’ll be better.” 

She took the glass and drank its contents me- 
chanically. A flush began to rise in her cheeks 
and her eyes brightened a little. 

“ I’m so glad to see you better ! ” said Sir Charles. 
“I am so glad, Madge. You are better? That’s 
right. Now, tell me, you’ve only been over- 
excited about some nonsense, isn’t it so? You 
didn’t mean anything of what you said about not 
marrying Rex ? ” 

“ I shall marry Rex,” said Margery very slowly 
and deliberately. “ Whatever happens, I shall 
marry him.” 

Oliver turned away and went over to the hearth. 
He stood there, looking into the fire. He did not 
want his face to be seen, for he fancied it was not 


174 


SUGGESTION. 


as entirely expressionless as he would wish. He 
could scarcely believe in his own power ; he could 
hardly credit what he had this moment seen hap- 
pen before his eyes. The phenomena of hypnotism 
and mesmerism are so miraculous in appearance 
that they often seem incredible to those who are 
the actual performers ; little wonder then if out- 
siders, or, to speak more accurately, those who 
have never experimented, look upon them with 
doubt and dismay. Oliver was full of triumph ; 
but a dreadful tremor disturbed this triumph. 
Was it the devil that made this girl’s mind a mere 
instrument for him ? It appeared impossible that 
it could be anything else or anything less ! 

Sir Charles was enchanted with Margery’s 
changed mood. 

44 1 thought it was only nonsense ! ” he ex- 
claimed. 44 But why did you talk like that ? 
Well, well I won’t ask you. You are ill and 
worn out, I’m sure. Don’t try to talk now, but 
rest this evening, and we’ll have a talk to-morrow. 
Isn’t that best? ” 

44 Yes, that’s best,” said Margery, in a very 


SUGGESTION. 


175 


tired, indifferent voice. She was looking fixedly 
at Oliver, and seemed unable to take her eyes from 
him. He was standing with his back to her. 
Presently she arose and approached him, holding 
out her hands. 

“What do you want me to do?” she asked. 
“ Haven’t I said enough ? ” 

Oliver started and turned round. He feared 
he had not waked her fully, and that she was still 
partly hypnotized. Sir Charles stared in amaze- 
ment. Her tone was so very earnest that it was 
impossible to think her words were anything less 
than tragic. They all stood like this a moment, 
Oliver being quite unable to decide how to answer 
her. Sir Charles broke the spell. 

“ She’s not right yet, and she takes you for 
Rex,” he said, “ that’s what it is. She’s got Rex 
on the brain. Madge, my dear, go to bed and 
sleep all this excitement off. I’ll bring you a 
night-cap myself. You must forget all this non- 
sense and stick to your good resolutions. Sleep 
on them, and make them firmer.” 

He led her out of the room, she yielding from 


176 


SUGGESTION. 


what looked like indifference, but which Oliver 
much feared was a remainder of the hypnotic 
state. He felt sure he had not thoroughly awak- 
ened her. But there was nothing to be done. 
He stood by the fire, biting the end of his mous- 
taches, and thinking over the situation in consid- 
erable perplexity. It is impossible for the hyp- 
notized to conceal his or her servitude to the 
hypnotizer so long as the sleep lasts in any degree. 
It would not be safe for Sir Charles to see him 
with her unless she was entirely awake. The idea 
that she confused him with Rex in her over- 
excited state was brilliant, and Oliver thanked Sir 
Charles for it profoundly; but it could not be 
expected to continue as a satisfactory explanation. 
However, he had got her into the right frame of 
mind, that was one thing. 

His deep rage against Rex filled all his mind 
and destroyed for the moment any feeling of 
doubt as to the righteousness of his actions. All 
he wanted was to act — to get the marriage over, 
and feel that Rex’s cherished bride was a mere 
tool in his hands, a slave for him to order 


SUGGESTION. 


177 


about. What a triumphant feeling it would be ! 
How that prig should be punished! Yes, indeed 
— punished, and made to pay. Success is an in- 
toxicant ; and Oliver was elated with the feeling 
that he knew one or two things more than his 
brother, and could hope to outwit him. With 
most of us wrong-doing is the result of impulse, 
when the mind is heated by anger or desire, and 
all better feelings are driven out by these passions. 
Oliver had been swayed to and fro hitherto ; he 
had continually hesitated over what he was doing, 
with the fear of hell-fire before his eyes. But now 
this fear seemed gone ; as a matter of fact it was 
only that he was more violently enraged than he 
had ever been in his life, and the strength of his 
passion drove out the fear of consequences for a 
much longer space of time than had ever happened 
before. A black hatred for Rex absorbed ail his 
being, and he yielded to it as he might have yielded 
to any less devilish passion, feeling its force as one 
feels the fury of a runaway horse, and leaving 
every thought of fear or of punishment till this 
12 


178 


SUGGESTION. 


should be over. It was deeply planted — right 
down in the deep recesses of his nature. He was 
one of those persons who readily feel themselves 
ill-used ; if it is not their friends who ill-use them 
it is their enemies, or else it is fate or circum- 
stances. Oliver was not driven to quarrel with 
abstractions ; he had felt ill-used by his father, and 
still more so by Hex. This cause of injustice 
done him had only to blossom out into the fierce 
hatred and longing for revenge which he now felt ; 
and it had the firm foothold of a permanent sense 
of injury. 

That night brought him no sleep — a very un- 
usual thing for him. Like most profligates he 
habitually slept well. But this night was the 
first of a long series; insomnia made its initial 
visit to him. He saw something which seemed 
like a crime, at the end of a vista of strange 
experiences, all of which fed his longing for 
triumph. His mind was intoxicated with the 
visions in which his figure always stood erect, 
while all others fell before him or crouched at his 
feet. He felt like a gambler with a full hand. 


SUGGESTION. 


179 


The delirium was on him ; he must pass down 
that vista and taste every delight it had to offer 
him, till he reached the very end with all its 
triumph and horror. 


180 


SUGGESTION . 


CHAPTER XIV. 

Margery slept heavily all that night, waking 
late the next day. She was very quiet, and an- 
imated by a fixed resolution — that which she had 
last expressed. She seemed to have no idea in her 
mind but that of her wedding, and to be entirely 
absorbed in planning the arrangements and mak- 
ing everything as smooth and easy as possible. 
Sir Charles was relieved beyond words to find her 
in this delightful — and, as it seemed to him, 
thoroughly sane and sensible humor. Oliver did 
not see her till lunch-time, when he very care- 
fully watched and studied her. Everything ap- 
peared to have faded from her mind except the 
one absorbing thought of her approaching mar- 
riage. This pleased him nearly as much as it 
pleased Sir Charles, though from very different 
reasons. Rex, when he came in early in the after- 
noon, was also well satisfied to find her in this calm 


SUGGESTION . 


181 


mood. She had seemed to him very variable and 
capricious of late, and, though she had struggled 
hard to conceal her emotions from him, he had 
been convinced that something was disturbing her. 
That was all over, so he concluded — some girlish 
capriciousness — and Margery was herself, only 
quieter and of more set purpose than was usual 
with her. 

Oliver felt sure that the impression he had left 
on her mind was strong enough to work itself out 
to the end without any further interference from 
him, and he determined to leave well alone. He 
would have had to exercise greater self-control 
than he found himself capable of at the moment 
to do otherwise ; for as soon as Rex’s voice was 
heard in the house he was seized with a murderous 
rage. He could not trust himself near him. The 
words Rex had used of him to Mrs. Carruthers 
came instantly back, singing through his head, 
and he felt the insane desire to go and throttle 
him, which with passionate men is the result of 
receiving an insult — especially a well-deserved 
one. But that would not do, He could not 


182 


SUGGESTION. 


afford any hasty or reckless retaliation. He left 
the house and walked aimlessly away through the 
fields, only determined to get safely out of reach. 

But at last he awoke to the fact that he was 
walking nowhere, in a very objectless manner. 
He would have sold his soul had there been 
market for it, to go off to some pleasant haunts in 
town. But want of money inexorably prevented 
him. What should he do then ? He remembered 
Hetty, who had been for soma time out of his 
mind. There was quite a serious motive in his 
mind for winning her, now that Rex had vowed he 
should not.. And besides, she would be rich ; she 
might be of great use if his other plans should fail 
in any way. 

So he turned and took another path which led 
him to the old Hall, and presented himself there 
as an early afternoon caller. Mrs. Carruthers was 
just going out herself, and no doubt would have 
managed to have made him believe that Hetty was 
not at home had not that young lady appeared at 
the hall door. She came, with her old aunt leaning 
on her arm, to see Mrs. Carruthers drive off. This 


SUGGESTION. 


183 


was one of the ceremonies of the clay, which al- 
ways had to be duly witnessed. Mrs. Carruthers 
delighted in creating a sensation, even if it was 
only in old Aunt Hetty’s simple mind. She loved 
to drive her spirited horses herself in their Amer- 
ican harness, which made the yokels stare ; and 
she dressed herself for it in the most perfectly 
correct manner, and yet one that made her seem 
like a tropical bird among barn fowls when she met 
a chaise full of country ladies in the lanes. What 
an unceasing wonder she was to these good creat- 
ures, some of whom really seemed to think her 
hardly human. Her hands were so very much 
smaller than any others in the county, and yet she 
drove a pair of horses such as one would only 
expect a very masculine woman to manage ; and 
who ever wore such wonderful little shoes, and 
skirts so wonderfully furbelowed, before in country 
lanes ? So perfectly was she equipped that it was 
indeed quite an occasion to have the chance of 
seeing her get into her carriage. Oliver assisted 
at the ceremony with all possible homage ; for he 
knew he was not much in favor with this imperi- 


184 


SUGGESTION. 


ous little lady, and that spite of all the sweetness 
of her smiles she would very easily find an excuse 
to cut him out of her visiting list. He was no 
more deceived in her than she was in him. He 
knew quite well that she was one with whom 
sweetness was second nature ; that she would 
smile even when sticking the knife in, should she 
ever decide to commit a murder in that disagree- 
able way. 

She drove off at last, and Oliver went in with 
the others to the library fire. Aunt Hetty en- 
sconced herself in her favorite chair and dozed ; 
and Oliver managed to get through the afternoon 
pleasantly enough. The young Hetty was lovely 
to look at, excited and flushed beyond her wont 
with the pleasure of his presence and the freedom 
from Mrs. Carruthers’ repression. She talked 
more readily than he had ever heard her, and suc- 
ceeded in amusing him more effectually than any 
woman ever had done. He reflected that life 
really would not be altogether impossible with 
such a quaint, beautiful creature, provided she 
had plenty of money. But would the others ever 


SUGGESTION. 


185 


let him have her and her money ? “ That little 

Mrs. Carruthers,” as he mentally called her, was 
an almost hopeless obstacle. Could he not get at 
that secret which lay between her and Rex, and 
intimidate her. 

If Hetty could have seen his mind! Every 
moment that he passed with her she was falling 
more hopelessly in love. He was entirely free 
from the stiffness, the reserved manner, which 
chilled and frightened her with most English- 
men ; and to her ears his voice and speech were 
marvellously soft and melodious. He literally 
charmed her; and when Mrs. Carruthers came 
back again late in the afternoon she found the trio 
still sitting over the library fire, holding a blind 
man’s holiday. Other callers had been, but they had 
been told Mrs. Carruthers was out ; so Oliver had 
had it all his own way, and had made the running 
in good earnest. Never had Hetty looked such a 
vision of beauty as when Mrs. Carruthers came 
into the room — such a wonderful cosmetic is 
pleasure. Mrs. Carruthers saw it instantly, and 
understood the meaning of this beauty only too 


186 


SUGGESTION. 


well. She came among them, to warm her hands 
at the fire, in the sweetest, most childlike manner, 
and with the frankest air imaginable. Oliver, 
studying her with sharpened wits, felt sure she 
would write to her husband by the next mail. How 
spiteful she made him feel with her smile that 
made one think of bon-bons ! He determined, 
from that moment, that he would assume the foot- 
ing of accepted lover as quickly as possible. 

And so he did ; it afforded him a passable pas- 
time while Hawthorndene was given up to wed- 
ding preparations, and he was unable to vary the 
monotony from sheer want of cash. He managed 
Mrs. Carruthers so cleverly that she could not 
actually turn him out ; he gave her no excuse. 
He won Hetty absolutely, so that the girl wor- 
shipped him with her whole ingenuous heart, and 
thought the sun only shone when he was present. 
But he never actually proposed to her — he was 
“ hedging ” — and he wanted to see Margery mar- 
ried, and find out how great his power over her 
would be, before he showed his hand with Hetty. 


SUGGESTION. 


187 


CHAPTER XV. 

The wedding-day came. Margery’s quiet and 
earnest mood had lasted uninterruptedly. N othing 
had occurred to rouse her from it, and Oliver had 
carefully avoided doing so. Its intensity had 
gradually faded, so that she became simply her 
natural self ; what she was before Mrs. Carruthers 
had appeared on the scene, or any abnormal powers 
had been developed in her. The misery she had 
endured had left its mark, both on her mind, and 
on her face, but these were lost sight of in her 
immediate happiness. It was Margery Hawthorn 
in her natural state, gay, merry, warm-hearted, 
trusting, who dressed herself in her white wedding 
dress. 

Everything was perfect, from the weather to the 
bride’s bouquet. 

The little village church was massed with flowers 
and filled with the country people, so that it 


188 


SUGGESTION. 


seemed quite transformed. Mrs. Carruthers came 
in late in a wonderful costume, the like of which 
had never been seen in the neighborhood before, 
and looking like a flower ; she absorbed the atten- 
tion of most persons present. But the bride and 
bridegroom were much too happy to care in the 
least whether other people thought them the centre 
of attraction, or not. Hetty, with her piquant 
beauty, left the seven staid young ladies who 
acted as bride’s-maids with her completely in the 
shadow ; they seemed to have been invented only 
as a setting for her. Oliver, who was best man, 
and secretly a little sulky over the boredom of it, 
feasted his eyes on her. The only other object 
which seemed to have much interest for him was 
the necklace on Margery’s neck. She wore the 
Ileriot diamonds, and wonderfully well they became 
her. 

Among the guests in the church were two 
strangers whom everyone stared at in surprise. 
They were evidently Jews, and wore diamonds 
worthy of a Rothschild. They came in very late, 
sat down quietly, and watched the service to the 


SUGGESTION. 


189 


end. They ensconced themselves in the porch to 
watch the wedding party go out, and when Oliver 
came by with Hetty on his arm one of them gently 
touched him on the arm. Oliver had not noticed 
them before, and he turned ashen pale. 

I’ll come up to town to-morrow, and see you,” 
he murmured, and hurried Hetty out of the porch 
and into the carriage. 

The two men quietly walked away down the 
road, each lighting a cigar. They went to the 
Heriot Arms and there demanded lunch. In the 
course of that lunch they learned a great deal. It 
was Mr. Rex, not Mr. Oliver, who had married 
the heiress of Hawthorndene. Certainly, down here 
in the neighborhood there had never been any 
doubt or confusion about that ; though it was true 
that at one time Mr. Oliver was thought to be 
sweet on Miss Margery. But that was before 
Mr. Rex came home from California. Since then 
he’d had it all his own way. And the beautiful 
young lady, the first bride ’s-maid ? Ah, she was a 
great match, very rich, much richer than Miss 
Hawthorn. People said she was secretly engaged 


190 


SUGGESTION. 


to Mr. Oliver, but that she would never be allowed 
to marry him. 


Extract from Mrs. Reginald Heriot’s 
Diary. 

“ My little book, I have something pleasant to 
record in you, for the first time. Yes, the first 
time ! Every page hitherto written has been the 
record of perplexity or distress — or what seemed 
like despair. Now I am so happy I cannot believe 
in ever feeling any distress again. 

“ Why did I ever doubt Rex’s love for me ? 
How could I ever doubt it ? It seems to enwrap 
me now like a warm soft cloud that veils me from 
every possibility of trouble or of doubt. 

“ What a beautiful world this is ! The sands 
gleam like silver in the sunshine to-day and the 
sea seems to be a vast turquoise. How perfectly 
still it is! There is the faint sense of life, of 
vibration in it that makes its stillness the more 
fascinating. It is just like my heart — silent from 


SUGGESTION. 


191 


intensity of content, but beating all the while, and 
ready to flame out into excitement at a touch. 

“ Why was I ever unhappy, or jealous, or doubt- 
ing? Because I was not with Rex, I suppose. 
Now I shall never be unhappy again. The ful- 
ness of content I feel is so profound that it must 
last always; I can never exhaust it. I fancy I 
am like one favored being in a dry land where 
there is no water — one who is given the secret of 
a magic well full of sweetness. People seem to 
grow old and tired in this world, but that is be- 
cause they have no magic well like mine to drink 
from — a deep well of perfect love and trust and 
mutual confidence. 

“ What a wonderful honeymoon mine has been. 
— why do I say has been ! It is only half over. 
But I find it hard to believe that week after week 
can follow on, so full of gay contentment. They 
say the bride is happy whom the sun shines on. 
It shone on my wedding-day — it has shone ever 
since ; there has not been one drop of rain or one 
cloud. Surely never was a bride so fortunate. 
All day long we have been out in our little boat, 


192 


SUGGESTION. 


dreaming the hours away between the blue sea 
and the blue sky, separated by the atmosphere 
of love and sunshine from all the cruel world. 
Well, when the rain comes — or when we have to 
be among other people again — still I am confident 
this atmosphere will be round us always. We 
shall always be in the sunshine of love now. 
My soul, my very soul, seems to have become a 
part of the man I love. I can never feel any 
shadow between us again. My Rex, why didn’t I 
trust you always! That’s what puzzles me. I 
suppose it was the intensity of my love made 
me jealous. Now I love you too well for such 
folly, and added intensity has given me per- 
fect confidence. 

“ To-day Rex has left me for the first time, to go 
up to town to see his solicitors about something 
or other. I thought I should suffer when I was 
left alone for the first time, and so I did, for a few 
minutes. It was like a stab at my heart — a knife 
stuck into me — to see him go off by the train and 
leave me. But that was only for a few minutes ; 
it left me directly, and I fell into one long dream 


SUGGESTION. 


193 


of memory — of his smile, of his tenderness, of his 
love — Ah, Rex ! my dear Rex ! — and I am dwell- 
ing deeply in it still. I could sit and dream and 
dream and remember for months and years, and 
yet be happy. But that would never be unless I 
lost him, and I shall never lose him ; for when 
he dies I shall die at the same moment, and noth- 
ing but death can part us ! 

“ There, there he is ! There he is ! crossing the 
sands. Why is he back so quickly ? Could he 
not bear to be away from me ? I must fly to meet 
him. Good-bye, little book, till I am sad or alone 
again.” 

Margery Heriot hurried down the staircase of 
the pretty cottage in which she was spending her 
happy honeymoon, and went quickly into the 
wide porch, wreathed with a great mass of cluster- 
ing ivy. The place was a perfect nook of fairy- 
land, surrounded by green grass and trees and 
shrubs, yet standing close upon the sand and sea. 
Rex had seen it by chance one day and determined 
to stay in its deep restfulness as long as Mar- 


194 


SUGGESTION. 


gery was content, and was not Margery content ? 
She stood framed in the porch like a goddess, and 
her chief charm was not that of beauty so much 
as supreme happiness. But she was very beautiful 
at this time, her vivid face full of glow, her ex- 
pressive eyes speaking sweet thoughts. 

The man she had come to meet quickly ap- 
proached the house. As he neared it, suddenly 
Margery’s face changed. “ My God ! ” she ex- 
claimed. 

It was Oliver. 

She had almost forgotten his existence. She 
didn’t want to see him. She moved back, thinking 
to retreat into the cottage and deny herself to him, 
for he seemed to bring some of the old distress 
with him. 

But already he stood in the porch, and his gaze 
had caught hers. She stared blankly back at him. 

“ You don’t seem very pleased to see me,” he 
observed, in a dry tone. “You’re in the 4 Edwin 
and Angelina ’ condition yet then ? You don’t 
want either a friend or an enemy. That’s nice for 
you ; but mayn’t I stay a minute or two ? ” 


SUGGESTION. 


195 


Margery sank down on the bench in the porch, 
under the shadow of the heavy drooping ivy. 

“ Why, of course I’m pleased to see you,” she 
said, trying to recover herself ; “ only you startled 
me. I thought you were Rex. Really, I took you 
for him as you crossed the sands, and I couldn’t think 
what had brought him back so suddenly. He’s 
gone up to town,” she added, by way of explanation. 

“ Oh, I know that,” he answered ; and then, after 
a pause, “ Don’t you think it’s chilly here ? Mayn’t 
we go in ? ” 

“ Why, of course,” said Margery, rising. She 
led the way into the drawing-room, which seemed 
so little and so low after the great rooms at Haw- 
thorndene ; but how she loved it and its quaint 
homeliness ! The tables were crowded with flowers, 
which were a passion with her. On her writing- 
table lay her diary ; but it was closed and locked. 
That was the one confidante who knew more of her 
than Rex, as yet. She had not come to the hour 
when she would give it him to read ; she was in- 
tending to do it ; but she did not want the idea of 
her jealousy to bring any cloud on their content. 


196 


SUGGESTION. 


And as it was all a thing of the past she thought 
it might wait. 

A fire burned on the hearth, looking bright and 
pleasant. Margery sat down beside it, in a low 
chair, and said nothing, leaving Oliver to com- 
mence the conversation. He began to talk, in a 
desultory way, about Sir Charles and the doings at 
Hawthorndene. Margery sat idly looking at the 
fire. Suddenly she felt his hand on her forehead, 
and heard the dreadful word “ Sleep ! ” in her 
ears. A profound wave of stupor swept suddenly 
over her brain. She struggled against it — cried 
out inarticulately — tried to rise, but Oliver’s hand 
was passing over her face ; he reiterated the word 
of command. Her arms fell powerless at her sides, 
and her eyelids drooped as though weighed down 
by mill-stones. 


TWO DAYS LATER. 

Extract from Mrs. Reginald Heriot’s 
Diary. 

“ I have to open this book, for I must write 
down my feelings, since I cannot speak them. 


SUGGESTION. 


197 


“ Once again I write to record terror, and per- 
plexity, and almost despair. 

“ It was not Rex whom I met at the door, but that 
other, so terribly like him that he deceives even 
my loving eyes at a little distance. 

“ He made me sleep. I could not resist. He 
changed me, made me another creature, a different 
woman. 

“ He wanted money, and I had to get it for him. 
When I woke I knew nothing else than that, and 
that I was not to let Rex know he had been here. 
I could not disobey him or even question him. I 
was spellbound. 

“ He went immediately, and left me alone. I was 
not really alone though ; it seemed as if his spirit 
was by my side, compelling me to act. 

“ That money must be got, and sent to him. It 
had to be done. I had no power to dispute the 
fact. Nor have I now. I have to do it, and I 
do not know how. I did not know then, except 
by an awful plan which filled my soul with horror; 
but I had to do it. There was no help for it. 
There was no other way. 


198 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Rex was not to be back till the following day. 
I took the next train to town and went straight to 
the bank, where I had left the Heriot diamonds 
with my mother’s jewels. My mother’s pretty 
things were valuable, but not sufficiently so ; if I 
sacrificed them all they would not bring what 
Oliver demanded. I knew that I must steal, that 
I must deceive Rex, but it did not trouble me. 
I only knew I had to do it, and I went to work 
like one in a dream, helplessly obeying my orders. 

u I took out the diamonds and went straight to 
our family jewellers in Bond Street, where I know 
one of the partners very well. I thought it would 
be easier to tell him what I wanted than a stranger, 
and besides he knew the value of the stones very 
well, having re-set them once for Mrs. Heriot. 
I should have to humiliate myself to him to get 
him to preserve secrecy ; but I must bear that. I 
felt at all events I could trust him. 

u Never shall I forget the blow he dealt me ! 
Shall I ever recover from it ? 

“ I saw him in his own private room and trem- 
blingly told him that I had a dreadful necessity to 


SUGGESTION. 


199 


realize on the diamonds ; that I preferred only to 
have an advance on them, as I must redeem them 
when I could and restore them safely. Oh, how 
my pride suffered as I talked to this man ! He 
seemed to look at me so strangely from time to 
time. 

44 He took the jewels from me and turned them 
over in his hands. Suddenly he rose, and excus- 
ing himself left the room for a few moments, carry- 
ing them with him. Presently he brought them 
hack, put them on the table and looked at me 
more strangely than ever. 

“ ‘ I am very sorry,” he said in a low, very dis- 
tinct voice. 4 1 don’t know if you are aware of it, 
but I am afraid I cannot help you. These are 
not the Heriot diamonds. These are paste.’ 

“ I started up as if electrified, and stood trem- 
bling all over. At last I found my voice. 

“ 4 It’s too late to go back to the bank,’ I said. 
4 Will you keep them for me ? and will you keep 
all this secret ? for my sake, for my father’s ? for 
my husband’s ? I must think what to do ! ’ 


200 


SUGGESTION. 


“ He promised, and I left him and came home, in 
a hopeless daze. 

“ Of course I understood what had happened. 
And I understood what a devil Oliver Heriot is. 
An incarnate devil he must be ! Yet I cannot 
resist his will. I know I have to obey him — I 
know I have to get that money for him. What 
am I to do? 

“ Oh, where is my happiness flown ? Ilex will 
be back soon — thank Heaven, he has been delayed. 
I don’t want him to come — I don’t want him to 
come ! Is not that horrible ! ” 


SUGGESTION. 


201 


CHAPTER XVI. 

Margery was sitting alone in her room writing 
in her diary. She laid down her pen at last, unable 
to write more, for the thoughts in her mind seemed 
too horrible for words. That she did not want Rex 
to return — that she dared not face him — that she 
did not know how to face him — filled her with dis- 
may. Could she be held responsible for the dis- 
appearance of the Heriot diamonds? Was it in 
any way her doing or her fault ? Impossible ! no 
one demurred at Oliver’s taking them to town — no 
one would have dreamed of doing so ; for though 
a profligate, he was a Heriot, and had never been 
known to do anything actually dishonest. She felt 
grateful for one thing only in the whole affair — 
that she had given the diamonds into Oliver’s charge 
in Rex’s presence. Why she did so she could not 
tell ; she wondered at it now ; and when it occurred 
to her that Oliver had perhaps used his influence 


202 


SUGGESTION. 


over her to make her do it, she laughed at herself 
for such a far-fetched notion. She was quite unable 
to measure, or even to guess at, the extent of his 
power over her. The inexplicable impulses which 
came to her sometimes, and which she felt absolutely 
compelled to obey — these she imagined sprang from 
the impulsiveness and variability of her own 
nature. It distressed and perplexed her to try and 
find out where her own will ceased to act, and she 
tried to prevent herself from thinking of the subject. 

But it was impossible ! Why was she bowed 
down now with the overpowering sense that she 
had to find this money for Oliver ? Why, when 
he had absolutely no kind of claim on her? Her 
mind tried to struggle from the spell that was on 
it, to free itself from the shackles that held it, but 
the effort was useless. She was as incapable of 
removing the idea that oppressed her from her 
mind, as a person who is drugged is incapable of 
physical movement. 

She sat at the table, still, lost in thought, or rather 
in the desperate attempt to think. She had a few 
hours yet before Rex’s return to determine what to 


SUGGESTION. 


203 


do. Her longing was to tell him everything, to 
show him her diary, to get him to help her. If 
she had done this, all the rest of her life would 
have been changed. If she had given up her will 
to Rex as she had given it to Oliver, his power over 
her would have been much the stronger because of 
the affection between them. But it was not to be. 
Sitting there alone with her thoughts it seemed to 
her that she entered into some sort of sleep, though 
her eyes were open ; it seemed to her that she felt 
a touch on her forehead, and that something stood 
beside her ! No — not something — it was no in- 
definite presence ; though invisible, it was no un- 
known shadow — it was Oliver. 

She felt him as plainly as though he were physi- 
cally present ; but the distress was infinitely greater.. 
A chill passed through all her frame, the dread 
chill of the supernatural, and the cold from it be- 
numbed her mind and heart and made her a helpless 
subject, without power to think or feel for herself. 
She only knew she had to obey the awful power 
that controlled her. 

So ignorant are we of the powers we wield, that 


204 


SUGGESTION. 


Oliver was simply trying an experiment, and was 
unable to ascertain whether he was successful. He 
resolved to put it to the test, and left her with an 
absolute command, which she had to obey at once, 
and whether she did so or not would prove to him 
whether she had understood his voice — whether 
he had indeed conquered matters and was able to 
influence her as easily from a distance as when 
he actually touched her and breathed on her. 

He found it was so. His success exceeded his 
wildest expectations. 

“ Before I sleep,” said Margery to herself when 
the cold chill began to leave her a little, “ I must 
write to Oliver "and tell him I will get that money 
for him immediately.” 

She could not rest till this was done ; when the 
note — which consisted simply of those words — was 
written, she put on a cloak and went out to post 
it, late though it was. 

When she came back she lay down on a couch 
in the drawing-room, wrapped in her cloak. She 
could not bring herself to go back to her own room. 
She felt a horror of it. She had the hopeless fear 


SUGGESTION. 


205 


upon her which always affects those who believe 
themselves haunted. All other thoughts were 
driven out of her mind by the one dread of feeling 
that cold touch again — of becoming aware of that 
unearthly presence beside her ! Not even the 
miserable consciousness that she had no idea how 
to get this money had the power to dispel the over- 
mastering dread that made her quiver. The thought 
that she had no means of satisfying the demand 
upon her came back into her mind at intervals, but 
each time she said wildly to herself that some way 
would come — some inspiration. It would have to 
be done — there was no escape. She had to find 
the way for herself ; that she knew. She could 
never tell Rex anything — never ! That was firmly 
fixed in her mind and she had it before her mental 
eyes always as a positive certainty. She would be 
lost, ruined, unhappy forever, if she took Rex into 
her confidence in any particular. Oliver had taken 
good care in his ghostly visitation, to leave this 
impression thoroughly implanted. He had re- 
iterated and reiterated the words “ You will be 
lost, ruined, unhappy forever if you tell Rex any- 


206 


SUGGESTION. 


thing whatever about me.” Her precious hap- 
piness ! How she loved Rex Heriot ! Her poor 
faithful heart beat for him only ; she lived for him 
only. She would suffer anything, bear anything, 
do anything, so that the joy she found with her 
husband should never be disturbed. A quivering 
martyr, she lay there through the long hours of 
the night, resolved only upon any sacrifice that 
might be necessary to retain her happiness. 

In the morning, when the housemaid came to 
open the drawing-room shutters she found the 
lamps still burning, and Mrs. Heriot lying on the 
couch in a restless, broken sleep, wrapped in her 
fur cloak. The girl was frightened and went for 
the other servants. When Margery opened her 
eyes intelligently she found herself in a flower- 
scented room lit with sunshine ; the servants were 
grouped round her — the cook was pouring raw 
brandy down her throat, the only specific she had 
any respect for personally ; the first few drops had 
had a miraculous effect ; — in the doorway stood 
Rex, aghast, amazed. He was wrapped up in a 
long ulster, with a travelling cap firmly wedged on 


SUGGESTION. 


207 


to his head, just as he had come out of the night 
train. At the sight of him all the loving woman 
in Margery was alive, and for the moment every- 
thing else was forgotten ; it seemed as though she 
had come out of a nightmare to the fresh sweetness 
of natural life. She sprang from the sofa, rushed 
to him and flung her arms round his neck. 
What a moment of supreme joy that was when she 
hid her face on his shoulder and forgot everything 
in the world, everything she had ever felt or thought 
except her love for him, her confidence in him ! 
This, at least, was a man, a noble creature to confide 
in and to trust. It was like salve on a wound, the 
very sense of his nobility and his strong presence. 

He held her in his arms and stroked the dark hair 
that had come unloosed and lay all tossed- upon 
her shoulders. 

“ Has she been ill ? ” he said. 

“ I didn’t know she was ill, sir,” said the house- 
maid. “ Not till I found her here this morning.” 

Rex said nothing more, but lifted Margery in his 
arms and carried her upstairs into her own room. 
He was a great strong fellow, and though Margery 


208 


SUGGESTION. 


was by no means ethereal, it was very easy for him 
to do this. He enjoyed the sense of power it gave 
him. He locked the door when he had laid her on 
her bed, and throwing off his ulster, set himself to 
wait upon her with all the delicacy and tenderness 
of a true nurse. Strong men who have the capa- 
city for protection are usually very tender ; and so 
it was with Rex. The combination of these char- 
acteristics was partly what made him so lovable. 
Margery clung to him with the desperate feeling 
that he was the only being who could save her, 
and yet knew that she could never ask him to do 
so. Perhaps this consciousness, the continual con- 
sciousness of the spell upon her, made her cling to 
him even the more. He petted and nursed her, 
thinking that she would grow calm and become 
like herself ; but instead of that she seemed to be- 
come more acutely distressed every moment. It 
was so — her love for him made her position the 
more terrible. She said nothing, only lay in his 
arms, white, breathing with difficulty, speechless 
and dry-eyed. Always in her mind was the one 
thought — the money. How was it to be got? 


SUGGESTION. 


209 


With Rex’s arms around her and his love so close, 
yet he might have been at the other side of the 
Atlantic for any good he could be to her. The 
confidence between them was gone — shattered ! 
In reality they were as strangers, living lives so 
different that neither could ever hope again to 
understand the other. 

At last she grew, to outward appearance, calmer ; 
and Rex left her for a little while to make his 
toilet. He returned, fresh as a daisy, and had 
breakfast brought to Margery’s room, cajoling her 
to take a little, while he made a genuine meal. 
Margery lay and watched him and wondered at 
moments which was the reality — this healthy, 
wholesome figure of the daylight, or that uncanny 
and evil one of the night. Could both be ? So 
strangely alike too ! — it seemed incredible. But 
it was only too true. The two images co-existed 
in her brain like the types of good and evil. Pres- 
ently Rex began talking of what had kept him in 
town. He had been signing settlements, and his 
will, which, he explained to her, left everything 

absolutely to herself and her heirs. Not a farthing 

14 


210 


SUGGESTION. 


to Oliver ! — his only near relation. And then he 
went on to say that it was chiefly Oliver who had 
kept him in town. He said that Oliver was in 
a worse scrape than ever and would soon be 
“ chucked ” by his own set at the place he was 
going. Some of his creditors had been led to be- 
lieve that it was he who was to marry Margery, 
and that his debts would be paid on his marriage ; 

but that was a trifling circumstance compared to 

* 

the debts of honor he had contracted in the frantic 
endeavor to right himself. 

“ He’s been trying to get over me in every con- 
ceivable way,” said Rex, “ personally, through 
the solicitors, even through mutual friends. But 
to hand over two or three thousand pounds to a 
hopeless gambler would be altogether too idiotic. 
It wouldn’t do him a particle of good. I’m sorry 
for him ; he’ll soon have every front door shut on 
him. But it’s his own fault. There, I won’t 
talk of him any more. I don’t know why I should 
trouble you about it when, you’re so ill. Why, 
you are whiter than ever ! ” 

Margery was afraid to be alone for a moment, 


SUGGESTION. 


211 


and would not let Rex leave her. She was in a 
state of hopeless procrastination, unable to decide 
how to act, unable to invent any plan. She could 
not endure her distress of mind unless she had Rex 
by her side, holding her hand, giving her the sense 
of comfort by his presence. Late in the day, hav- 
ing gathered a little courage, she told him of her 
hurried journey to town, of her having taken the 
diamonds from the bank to her jewellers. She 
told him it was because she wanted some money 
for herself in a hurry, more money than she had 
at her own account ; that she had intended to 
borrow on them, but had been advised not to 
do so. 

Having started on this story she was obliged to 
be circumstantial. She told him her idea was to 
borrow the money till she could sell one of her 
own farms and replace it. Her dread was that if 
she ceased speaking he would ask her a question 
she would not be able to answer without hesita- 
tion, and so she went on with her tale, trying to 
disarm him of all points. She said she lost the 
money in a foolish speculation, and begged him 


212 


SUGGESTION. 


not to ask her any questions, because she was 
worried over it and did not want to have to go 
into it. 

44 So this is what made you so ill ! ” said Rex. 
44 Well, you are rich enough to indulge in foolish 
speculations ; but still, this is rather a large order. 
However, if you would really rather not talk 
about it I won’t bother you at present. Only I 
hope to Heaven you haven’t taken to gambling. 
Forgive me, dear, I didn’t mean anything; but 
you know stock exchange speculation is simply 
gambling under another name ; and I suppose that 
is where you’re money’s gone. Now, do you 
want me to get the money for you ? Shall I write 
to town now? I must have you look yourself 
again at any cost ! But, Madge, be a sensible 
girl and tell me all about it, and let me settle it 
all for you.” 

44 Don’t ask me ! ” she said. 

44 All right,” answered Rex. Be it remembered, 
it was still their honeymoon. 

And so it was settled. He wrote to her solici- 
tors, and Margery, worn out by the mental excite- 


SUGGESTION. 


213 


ment, fell off into a sudden sleep of exhaustion. 
Rex took the opportunity to go out of the room 
for a little while, and haying written his letter 
took it to the post himself. 

Margery imagined that she had made herself 
safe at all points. She would not have felt it 
necessary to tell Rex of her journey to London 
hut for the servants. She thought now she had 
dealt with everything they knew. She forgot that 
servants always know everything, and generally a 
great deal more than has ever happened. At all 
events they are to be trusted to know all that has 
happened. Margery supposed that no one had 
seen Oliver come or go. But the cook, an obser- 
vant lady, had been looking out of a side window 
when he arrived ; had taken him for Rex, and was 
much surprised at his absence later on. She was 
anxious to get at the bottom of this mystery, so 
she managed to waylay Rex on his return from the 
post, in order to express her deep sympathy with 
Mrs. Heriot', and to ask if she could not do some- 
thing for her. 

“I’m afraid you must have thought us very 


214 


SUGGESTION. 


neglectful, sir, to let the mistress be downstairs 
ill all night ; but we none of us knew she was ill. 
But she’s never been the same, sir, since that after- 
noon you came back so sudden and went away 
again so soon — you’ll remember, sir, three days 
ago. She has been upset ever since.” 

“ What on earth are you talking about ? ” said 
Bex staring at the woman in unfeigned amazement. 

“ Well, sir,” said the woman coughing apolo- 
getically, “ I saw you come in myself or else per- 
haps none of us would have known it.” 

“ Saw me come in ? ” repeated Rex, in a pro- 
found surprise. “ Well, just tell me what you 
did see.” 

She explained to him how she was looking out 
of a side-window and saw him walking over the 
sand to the house ; how Margery had come to 
meet him and they had gone into the drawing- 
room and talked for some time, and then he had 
gone away back to the station. “ And very much 
surprised I was, sir,” said she, “ for I was just 
going off myself to get in the things for your 
dinner.” 


SUGGESTION. 


215 


“ Thanks,” said Rex rather absently. “ Well — 
that’s all right. I was surprised at your amount 
of information, that was all, not having seen any of 
the servants myself.” 

He walked a little away from the house as if to 
get more air; and then stood still suddenly and 
uttered one word aloud — 

“ Oliver ! ” 

He stood like a statue, thinking. There was 
only one possible conclusion to draw. Oliver had 
spoken very significantly to him before he went to 
live at Hawthorndene, on that day when they met 
in the harness room at Heriot Hall. Every word 
of Oliver’s came back to his mind now. No doubt 
he had been supplanted in Margery’s heart. There 
could be no other explanation. 


216 


SUGGESTION . 


CHAPTER XVII. 

An hour later Rex went into the house again, 
and went slowly up the stairs to Margery’s room. 
She was asleep. He stood and looked at her a 
moment, and then sat wearily down in a chair 
near her. 

“ She seemed to love me so well ! ” he said to 
himself. “ What an actress ! How wicked women 
are.” 

He did not form any plan of action except that 
he intended to spare her. His was not a vindictive 
jealousy, hut a suffering one. The conviction 
that the happiness of his life was gone entered 
into him like a deep wound. So far as Margery 
was concerned, pain and grief were the only feelings 
he was conscious of. 

Now and again a flash of bitterness lit up his 
soul ; it was when, in the weary revolution of 
thought, the image of Oliver came before his 


SUGGESTION. 


217 


mental vision. A spasm of hatred and rage passed 
through him then which, when it had gone, filled 
him with horror. It was unlike anything he had 
hitherto experienced. True, the Heriot temper 
lurked deep down in him somewhere ; once or 
twice in his life he had been carried away by 
blind fury. It was always in self-defence. The 
evil in him was not active. When once it was 
roused it was terrible, and terrified even himself. 
He felt he could kill Oliver. When he thought of 
him, his hands opened and closed again as they lay 
on his knees. There is no hatred like that between 
blood relations when once it is roused. And 
these two were so near — and so like ! — so terribly 
like when the same side of the character predomi- 
nated. That likeness, that nearness, made the 
hatred so much more horribly intense. 

That Margery loved him ! was ready to sacrifice 
herself for him ! — It seemed to Rex it would have 
been so much easier to bear this if the man her 
heart had gone to had been utterly unlike him, 
his opposite, instead of this man he despised so, 
yet who was so near and so like himself. Of 


218 


SUGGESTION. 


course we always think if a pain were different 
from what it actually happens to be, it would be 
easier to bear. To Rex, however, the position he 
was in seemed unique in its hatefulness. 

Oliver was like him ; yes, so like him as to be 
mistaken for him. But he was the worst side, the 
ugly side, of himself— a side so ugly that he hated 
and despised it. 

But Margery preferred it. She loved it as she 
could not love himself. Probably the comfort she 
found in his presence, the clinging that seemed so 
like love, waa merely because of his likeness to 
Oliver ! 

No doubt she had loved Oliver long ago, before 
Rex came back from California. She had accepted 
himself because he was the heir ; Oliver had 
probably driven her into the marriage in order 
that she should be able to supply him with funds. 

Was Oliver actually her lover? 

Oh, the awful pangs of jealousy ! The mental 
and physical agony ! Rex had never tasted them 
till that moment. Poor Margery had already 
suffered them out to the bitter end for him. But 


SUGGESTION. 


219 


he experienced them as something new, something 
unexpected, horrible, undeserved, almost unimag- 
inable. But true ! — Yes, true. His head drooped 
as the bitterness of it entered his soul. 

Hitherto he had always been able to hold his 
head high. He had been the favorite son, the 
trusted one, the honest steward, the one his father 
had leaned on, the one Margery had preferred. 

And now that he felt she no longer preferred 
him all that pride which had been his pleasure was 
gone at one blow. He had not guessed till now 
how much he cared for her, how absolutely she 
was the centre of his life. His pride was wounded 
in its tenderest place. Nowhere else could he have 
been hurt so sorely. He had loved her so well, so 
utterly, in such confidence ! And all the while 
she had been deceiving him, marrying him only 
for money, preferring this scoundrel to himself. 
His hands opened and closed again. 

Then came the revulsion — the reaction. 

Could there be any mistake ? Had she done it 
out of pity ? Perhaps she could explain it all to 
him very simply if he asked her to. 


220 


SUGGESTION. 


He leaned forward and looked at her again. 
She slept deeply and quietly, from profound ex- 
haustion. There were deep marks of suffering on 
her face which, as Rex studied them, seemed to 
him new. At all events they had never been so 
deep before. What was there that could make 
her suffer, except her own guilt ? Nothing. 
There could he nothing else. 

It was not too late yet to send a telegram to 
Margery’s solicitors, countermanding the orders 
given in his letter. The idea of doing this came 
to him with a sense of relief. He would spare her 
as well as he could, but he would punish the 
scoundrel who had stolen her love from him. He 
would protect her from the consequences of her 
foolish love, despite herself. 

Fired by this sudden thought, he hastily went 
out of the room, out of the house, and walked to 
the post-office. In a few minutes he had framed 
and sent a message. 

This relieved him. He told himself he was 
relieved because he had served Margery’s interests. 
But underneath this superficial feeling was a keen 


SUGGESTION. 


221 


glow of satisfaction at haying frustrated Oliver’s 
plans. 

That night, and the next day, seemed very 
strange to these two. Margery was timid, anxious, 
silent, Rex was absorbed and absent; he kept 
away from her as much as possible. Margery 
imagined he was annoyed with her for her secrecy. 
This she had expected ; she was not surprised, but 
took it as a deserved punishment. She was 
helpless, powerless ; she had no will to save herself 
from this punishment. All she could do was to 
bear it patiently. There were none of the accus- 
tomed smiles on her face ; its bright vivacity was 
gone. A haggardness had fallen upon it, and the 
drawn lines showed the sharpness of her suffering. 
The terrible thing to her was that Rex’s absent- 
ing himself from her so much seemed to throw her 
back upon Oliver ; that dreaded shade was always 
at her side, terrifying her, controlling her will, 
controlling her thoughts. When Rex held her 
hand in his she lost this terror for the moment 
through the sheer comfort of wholesome human 
companionship. But now this comfort was 


222 


SUGGESTION. 


denied her ; and she was too humble to ask 
for it. 

Two days passed like this. Rex never referred 
to the subject of the money again, nor did Mar- 
gery ; she had not the courage to. But she grew 
more and more uneasy at Rex’s silence. What 
did it mean ? What had he done ? Why had he 
not received an answer from the solicitors and 
spoken of it to her, as a matter of course ? 

At last driven by the controlling force that was 
upon her she asked him what he had done. 

“ Countermanded the order,” he said briefly. 
“ Second thoughts are best ; you are able to give 
your own orders, and I can’t do anything for you 
in a matter about which you won’t give me your 
confidence.” 

She sank back in her chair, her eyes wide open, 
and fixed upon him. 

What should she do ? 

Of course she could write herself, realize 
upon some of her own property, and hand the 
money over to Oliver. That was easily done now ; 
but by doing it, without explanation, she de- 


SUGGESTION. 


223 


stroyed the confidence between them, and their 
happiness together, forever and ever. 

She saw that very plainly. She was unable to 
free her will from the control upon it ; but where 
Rex was concerned her intelligence could not be 
blinded absolutely. She was sacrificing her whole 
life. The horrible consciousness of this paralyzed 
her, as she sat silently looking at her husband. 
He had turned away from her, and was lighting a 
cigar. When it was lit he went out. 

No caress, no look — a blank. Well, it was 
deserved. She cowered before this consciousness. 
A good woman, suffering a punishment she believes 
to be deserved, suffers as nothing else can that lives. 
For in her there is the innate sense of rectitude 
highly developed ; and it is cultivated by tradition 
and training to the utmost point. There is no 
half-way house for a noble woman ; no mode of 
excuse which will serve her as an aid in the hour 
of darkness. She has been taught the pure code 
of ethics, which is considered unnecessary for 
men ; nobility and truth in all things. God help 
her if she fails in any particular ! 


224 


SUGGESTION. 


Margery had failed. She knew it. Her punish- 
ment was already upon her in that knowlege. 
How it hurt ! Rex, for whom she would have 
given her heart’s blood, knew that she had some 
secret she dared not tell him ! She recognized 
that he probably thought it would be much worse 
than it was. But never for one second, never 
during one flash of thought did she guess what 
he did think. 

She was more stupefied by the sense of her own 
impotence than anything else. Her will was so 
crushed — she was in a state of such mortal terror 
that she had no idea how to act. 

Surely if she gave Oliver all he wanted he would 
cease to trouble her, and she would begin to repair 
her errors ! She would never put herself in his 
power again. She would recover her strength 
and defy him. Her native courage gave her this 
hope. 

Alas, poor Margery ! How little does the ordi- 
nary world know of the mysterious powers which 
rule its life. She did not realize that her strength 
and her courage were no longer her own, but 


SUGGESTION. 


225 


belonged to the man who controlled them. They 
existed for him, and for his purposes. 

Sitting in her chair, she sat turning over in her 
mind what she could do. She planned a letter to 
her solicitors, and looked across the room at her 
writing-table. But she had no volition which 
would enable her to go to it. The table seemed 
to be miles off, and her limbs made of adamant. 

Why was this so? She did not know; she 
imagined she must be exhausted, ill, tired out. 
But in reality her will was subservient to another 
will. She was not in a condition to control her 
owii body. She had to wait for orders which 
must emanate from another brain. 

It seemed as if at last the order came. She got 
up and moved across to the table, sat down and 
took the pen in her hand. An unutterable horror 
came upon her at the same moment — a sense that 
some one was standing by her side, controlling 
her. Could it be so? She laid her pen down — 
but instantly took it up again. She commenced 
a letter, filling in the date very carefully. 

While she was writing it, and writing in a half 

_ 15 


226 


SUGGESTION. 


consciousness, scarcely thinking of what she was 
doing, Rex came in at the door. He went up to 
her and looked over her shoulder. She started 
back violently, but already he had seen what was 
written. 

“ What ! ” he said, “ four thousand of your 
money for that spendthrift devil ! Not exactly. 
Why, it was only two thousand last night ! At this 
rate you will give him all you possess in a week. 
No, Margery, you shall not do it. I am your hus- 
band, and I will save you.” 

He snatched the letter from the table and flung 
it in the fire. In a second it had vanished. Mar- 
gery looked at him with wide eyes and parted lips. 
She said nothing. 

A frightful impulse had come upon her, when 
he did this, that froze the blood in her veins and 
paralyzed every feeling in her body, every thought 
in her brain. It was — 

“ Kill him ! Kill him ! ” 

Kill him ! Her darling, the love of her life, the 
being she lived for, — Rex ! Kill him ! Why ? 
What for ? Why should she kill him ? She 


SUGGESTION. 227 

could not tell, but she believed she had to do it. 
Suddenly this vista of horror opened itself before 
her and she saw she had to walk down it. In 
thought — yes, only in thought, of course — no one, 
no power could make her do it in reality. But 
why should she be compelled even to think of it ? 
To face the horror for a second? Why? She 
protested wildly within herself, even while the 
thought remained written as it were in her brain. 

Her Rex ! What a horrible thought, that of 
seeing him dead ! Her Rex, whom she loved so 
dearly ! 

She steadied herself and rose from the table. It 
was impossible even to look at this man whom she 
loved so dearly with this criminal, cruel feeling 
upon her ! 

Presently this passed off a little. The impres- 
sion faded from her mind, the agony of her brain 
lessened. She turned and looked at him. 

He was standing by the fire, smoking a cigar 
caught viciously between his teeth. If she had 
seen him then she would have known that he 
looked now as he had looked when he was talking 


228 


SUGGESTION. 


to Oliver in the harness-room at Heriot Hall, long 
since ; on that day when Oliver told him he in- 
tended to go and live at Hawthorndene, and warned 
him of the results. 

It was the same look now : weary, disgusted. 

It was new to Margery; something she had 
never seen before. 

To Rex it was as if Margery was not present ; 
as if he had to deal with Oliver. Disgust and 
anger entirely blotted out the affection and ten- 
derness which were strong in him for Margery. 

But as Margery recovered herself a little, so did 
he. As she returned to her natural feeling, so he 
became drawn towards her by them. 

A sudden impulse took her across the room to 
him, her hands stretched out. 

“ Rex,” she said, “ forgive me. Oh, if you 
knew how I love you ! Forgive me the past, and 
the future. Whatever has happened, whatever 
may happen ! forgive me, for I love you ! ” 

Never had she looked more beautiful than in 
this sudden moment of love which came in the 
midst of her misery ; never had her voice sounded 


SUGGESTION. 


229 


so seductive. He caught her to him and kissed 
her passionately, all the weariness and disgust 
fading quickly from his face. 

In this glad moment Oliver was utterly for- 
gotten. To each of them it was as if he had 
never lived. 

It is this oblivion which makes the supreme 
pleasure of love. For a little while the waters of 
Lethe wash over the soul, leaving it cleaned and 
refreshed almost as though new-born. 

The incident of the letter was not mentioned 
between them. Rex took it as a concluded epi- 
sode ; he believed her heart had rushed back to him 
again. And he was too happy in the reconcilia- 
tion to analyze further. To Margery it seemed as 
if the first joy of her honeymoon had come back. 
She knew it would go again — that this reprieve 
was only for a moment, and the knowledge of 
this made her cling to it the more desperately 
while she had it. 


260 


SUGGESTION. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

The next morning when Margery opened her 
eyes in the daylight it seemed to her that she had 
escaped from a terrible nightmare — that she was 
emerging from it. She felt tired, faded, worn, as 
though years had passed over her head in the last 
few days ; but she fancied she was free again and 
safe in the love between Rex and herself. 

But this was only the lull before the crisis of 
the storm. On that day came the hardest struggle 
she had yet encountered. 

After breakfast Rex went out, but she stayed 
at home alone, for she felt exhausted and dis- 
inclined for any exertion. She sat by the fire in 
the drawing-room and opened a novel, without, 
however, being able to keep her attention on it for 
more than a few minutes. She never turned a 
page, for before she had read to the bottom of the 
first one the book fell into her lap and her head 
fell back on the cushions she was leaning against. 


SUGGESTION. 


231 


It appeared to her that a voice close beside her 
said loudly and distinctly “ Sleep ! ” 

The wave of drowsiness swept over her so sud- 
denly and deeply that it was as if she had fallen 
into a stupor. And then her lips began to move 
and broken sentences to come from them. She 
was answering an invisible question. 

“ No — I have not done it — I have left it — Rex 
told me to — I have done as he told me — I cannot 
do as you told me — It would displease him — It 

would make him angry — I cannot do it ” 

The stupor became more profound, and her whole 
body took on an appearance of inertness that was 
like death. Her lips ceased to move ; she fell into 
a depth of unconsciousness in which it was impos- 
sible for her body to record or recognize. It was 
as if her spirit had actually left her body. For 
quite a long time she remained like this ; then 
faint signs of returning life appeared. She began 
instantly to cry out, as if she were engaged in a 
desperate battle of words with someone, “ I cannot 
— I will not ! It is impossible ! — I cannot.” 

Suddenly she opened her eyes, and looked round 


232 


SUGGESTION. 


the room in utter bewilderment. By degrees she 
began to realize where she was. 

44 How awful,” she said in a low voice of horror, 
to herself. 44 How absolutely awful ! ” 

She sat as if paralyzed by some frightful vision 
that was before her eyes ; sat as if turned to stone, 
until she heard Rex’s step at the doorway. Then 
she started up and escaped from the room, rushing 
past him and away upstairs. Rex looked after her 
in amazement; then slowly followed her. The 
door of her room was locked, and she would not 
answer him. He turned and went downstairs 
again, a heavy gloom on his face. 

44 Some new development ! ” he thought to 
himself. And their happiness which seemed to 
have returned appeared to him to have taken wing 
for good and all. The recurrent mysteries must 
kill it out, so he thought, sadly. 

He went into the drawing-room and sat down in 
a deep chair, in his favorite lounging attitude, and 
fell to staring into the fire. His thoughts were 
not very clearly formed, but they were very 
painful. 


SUGGESTION. 


233 


After some time he heard Margery’s footstep 
on the stairs. She came down very slowly. She 
walked into the room with a singular reluctant air, 
as if she was forcing herself into his presence by a 
sheer effort of will. She came near the fire, but 
stood with her head turned away, looking out of 
the window. 

44 Rex,” she said, 44 I’ve a fancy to go home. Do 
you mind ? ” 

He started with surprise. Sitting forward in 
his chair he looked at her very earnestly. 

“ When do you want to go ? ” he asked at 
last. 

44 Oh ! ” she said, with a sort of desperate sigh, 
44 at once if it were possible. Something terrible 
will happen if I don’t ! ” 

44 What, to-day? — now? ” 

44 Yes,” she answered. 

He again paused a moment or two before speak- 
ing, then he said, very sadly — 

44 1 suppose it is of no use asking you to explain 
this to me. I conclude that scoundrel has com- 
municated with you in some way while I have 


234 


SUGGESTION . 


been gone. Has he been here ? ” with sudden rage ; 
“ can I find him anywhere ? ” 

“ No,” she said stonily, “ he has not been here ; ” 
and the very iciness of her manner carried convic- 
tion with it. The rage died away as suddenly 
as it came, and utter sadness took its place 
again. 

u I am ready,” he said dully. “ Perhaps you will 
speak to your father, if you will not to me. You 
must speak to someone. I’ll give the orders at 
once.” 

Rex was an accustomed traveller, and one of the 
practical kind, ready for forced marches or any 
emergency. He made no trouble about a hasty 
return, but simply went out and sent two telegrams, 
one to the housekeeper at Heriot Hall, and one to 
Sir Charles. He was glad of the idea of returning, 
for something in Margery’s manner had thoroughly 
alarmed him. 

She avoided him all the rest of the time, making 
the preparations an excuse for keeping out of his 
way. When she had to be with him she never 
looked him in the face, and preserved an impene- 


SUGGESTION . 


235 


trable stoniness of manner except for an occasional 
spasm of extreme nervousness. It was as if she had 
been changed into another person. 

“ Something awful must have happened,” thought 
Rex, over and over again ; “ what has that brute 
threatened, to terrify her so ? ” 

If he could but dimly have guessed the truth ! 
If he could have imagined that she was in the state 
in which a faithful dog is when madness is coming 
upon it, and its love makes it run from its master 
lest it should bite him. 

“ Kill him ! — kill him,” — these dreadful words 
filled her mind, and an insane desire to spring at 
him — to strangle him — came upon her whenever 
she was near him. 

Sfie was afraid to be alone with him, lest she 
should do some terrible thing. Her one sane idea 
was to get home, to be near friends who would 
protect her from herself or from whatever it was 
that was controlling and possessing herself, and be 
able to speak to someone. She did not yet know 
who she could speak to, but she knew it would 
help her only to have the possibility within reach. 


236 


SUGGESTION. 


In her stupor a vision had been shown to her. 
She had seen herself taking the life of the man she 
loved in his sleep. 

Was it possible she could be made to do a horrible 
crime without knowing she did it, as she had done 
lesser things ? The idea that this might be possible 
haunted and terrified her. Worse still, she was 
conscious of the growing desire to do it. It was 
as if two beings were in her body, contending 
furiously, dragging her hither and thither, first 
one way and then the other. It was an awful con- 
dition and she felt that it would be impossible to 
maintain it ; in time she must yield ! 

Late that night they got home to Heriot Hall. 
As much preparation as could be made in so short 
a time had been made. There was a bright fire, 
some supper, and best of all, Sir Charles waiting 
for them. He was so delighted to see Margery 
again that he noticed little ; and helped by his 
bluff heartiness, Margery managed to put on some- 
thing of her ordinary manner. She made him tell 
her about everything and everybody, and sit over 
the supper-table late into the night. Her one 


SUGGESTION. 


237 


horror was the idea of being left alone with Rex ; 
and she turned over all sorts of wild expedients in 
her mind. Could she insist on going home with 
her father, representing it as a mere mad-brained 
freak ? No, that was impossible ; it would puzzle 
him too much and wound Rex too deeply. Be- 
sides, it grew so late that Rex insisted on Sir 
Charles staying; and he agreed readily enough. 
After all, that was something. Sir Charles liked 
sitting up, and she could sit and talk to him till 
she fell asleep in her chair. Rex let her do as she 
liked, observing her feverish efforts at conversa- 
tion with anxiety and dismay. 

The one person who was mentioned by none of 
the three was Oliver. His name seemed to be 
avoided by mutual consent. At last, however, Sir 
Charles spoke of him inadvertently. He was talk- 
ing of his favorite subject, his horses. “ Gray- 
beard’s dead lame,” he said ; “ I hope they’ll look 
after him ; Oliver’s no good — in fact ’twas Oliver 
lamed him this very afternoon, damn him. I beg 
your pardon, Rex, I hadn’t meant to mention the 
matter, hut it slipped out.” 


238 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Oliver lamed him ! ” said Rex in surprise, 
“ hut he’s a good rider.” 

“ When he’s sober he is,” said Sir Charles in a 
tone of deep disgust, “ but he was drunk this after- 
noon and half mad. I never saw him in such a 
state before. How the men could let him go out 
on the horse I can’t think.” 

Rex said nothing in answer to this. Margery 
sat listening with a blanched face. 

“ You’re tired, child,” said Sir Charles, noticing 
her pallor, “ why don’t you go to bed ? ” 

“ I will directly,” she said, “ but I want to hear 
about Oliver. I never knew him to drink like that.” 

Rex looked up surprised at the coolness of her 
tone, and scrutinized her keenly. “ What an actress 
she is ! ” he again thought to himself In wonder. 
W as it possible for a woman to speak in such an 
indifferent tone of the man who controlled her 
heart and her affections ? That was what Rex 
asked himself in a profound amazement. How 
impossible it was to know people, he reflected ; 
how utterly different Margery was from what he 
had always believed her to be. 


SUGGESTION. 


239 


“ Ch, there’s nothing more to tell you,” said Sir 
Charles, trying to pass over "the subject lightly. 
“ I didn’t intend to refer to it this first night I’ve 
got you back, but I’ll own I’ve been uneasy about 
the boy lately. He’s been very strange, as if he’d 
something on his mind ; I suppose it’s these money 
difficulties of his. But the last two days he has 
been like a wild creature, as queer as possible, and 
mad drunk by the evening. I declare he has put 
me in mind of a man who has committed a 
murder or means to, and who’s not able to think 
of anything else.” 

Rex got up and went across to Margery. 
“ She has fainted,” he said. 


240 


SUGGESTION . 


CHAPTER XIX. 

Neither Sir Charles nor Rex went to bed that 
night at all, for Margery was very ill and they 
were too anxious to leave her. They hovered 
about her room till the morning came, watching 
and waiting. 

In the daylight she looked pale and wan, like 
some stricken creature. She had no power to 
rouse herself, or move from where she lay ; she 
was full of dread of the next attack that would 
come upon her, when she would again he possessed 
by this horrible madness. For that was what it 
seemed to her to be when she thought of it in 
calmer moments. She was calm now, but utterly 
exhausted. 

Her craving was never to he alone ; and her 
ceaseless desire was to speak out to someone. It 
was impossible to speak to her father, she found, 
when she tried to. He was of so utterly prosaic a 


SUGGESTION 


241 

temperament that she felt he would never under- 
stand anything she attempted to tell him, and 
the words died on her lips as they were formed. 

Who was there ? It is only when real trouble 
comes that we realize fully how few friends we 
have. For a friend must not only be willing, but 
sympathetic and, above all, intelligent. When 
all these things are required it is quite wonderful 
how the list of one’s friends narrows down. 

Who was there ? Suddenly the memory of a 
fresh, sweet, honest face came before her. Hetty ! 

She raised herself directly, and begged Rex to 
let her write a note and to send a carriage with it. 

“ I know she will come,” she said, “I am sure 
she will come.” 

“ What’s made you take such a sudden fancy ? ” 
asked Sir Charles. 

“ I don’t know,” said Margery wearily. “ But 
I think she’ll make me feel better, she is so 
bright.” 

It is strange how in deep and awful trouble the 

longing for someone’s face, the craving for one 

particular human presence, sets in, and nothing 

16 


242 


SUGGESTION. 


else seems to relieve the pain. So it was with 
Margery now. She longed for the sight of Hetty 
Carruthers’ fresh face as in a fever one longs for 
water. And when Hetty came she appeared to 
bring a new atmosphere into the room — something 
bright and fresh like a sea-breeze. 

“ Why, you’re sick ! ” she said. “ That’s too 
bad. I’m so glad I was home and could just come 
right away. Well, what’s wrong that you look so 
strange, anyway ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” answered Margery. “ Come 
and sit near if you don’t mind, and let me look at 
you. You seem so fresh.” 

“ Why surely ! But say, ’taint encouraging to 
look at you, anyhow, you ain’t happy. I’m cer- 
tain of it, just as sure as I’m alive.” 

“ No, I’m not,” said Margery seeing it was 
useless to fence with such a direct and positive 
person. 

“ I guess I oughtn’t to speak out so straight, 
but tain’t in me to go into things elegant. I 
wish you didn’t seem so white. What’s wrong, 
anyway. Will ye speak?” 


SUGGESTION. 


243 


“Not yet,” said Margery, “talk to me about 
yourself and all you have been doing.” 

Of course, led on by degrees, Hetty very soon 
began to talk about Oliver. She worshipped him, 
and could neither see or imagine any flaw in her idol. 
As she talked on, Margery grew more and more 
silent, thinking deeply and hopelessly. It was 
terrible to her to find this girl’s pure heart had 
gone out so completely in such a direction. What 
could be done ? What would be the end of it ? 
She was oppressed by the anxious thoughts that 
crowded in upon her, and hardly listened to much 
of Hetty’s quaint talk. That young lady soon 
found this out and tried a new mode of distrac- 
tion. 

“ ’Tis such a lovely day,” she said, “ do get up 
and come out. I know ye feel sick, and as if you’d 
lie just there till the end of time. But you’ll feel 
real set up if you’ll come out in the air. Do now 
— to please me.” 

Who could resist that lovely flushed face and 
those soft dark blue eyes ! No one who had either 
a sense of lovableness or a sense of loveliness. 


244 


SUGGESTION. 


Hetty appealed to both, and Margery possessed 
both strongly. It was a deep pleasure to her to 
feel the soft touch of those kind arms about her, 
the contact of Hetty’s sweet face against her own. 
It rested and refreshed her. She felt as if it were 
possible to rouse herself in order to please this 
beautiful creature. And so, before long, these 
two came out upon the terrace in front of the 
Hall and walked up and down in the sun, arm in 
arm. Margery began to feel as if she had really 
escaped fr<*m the nightmare she had passed through, 
and the two were talking together with a gayety 
which seemed as natural to one as to the other — 
when suddenly the whole world changed to them 
both. To one it was as if a light from Heaven 
came ; to the other a blackness as of hell. 

A man on horseback was riding up the avenue, 
and the two girls recognized him at the same mo- 
ment with these opposite feelings. 

It was Oliver Heriot. He rode up to the Hall 
door ; a servant came out for his horse, and in a 
moment he was by Margery’s side. She scarcely 
spoke to him ; she would not raise her eyes. She 


SUGGESTION. 


245 


was filled with a horror and terror she was 
ashamed of. Iletty talked for both, and seemed as 
gay as possible. She was troubled, nevertheless, 
by Margery’s unexpected coldness and silence, and 
also by something which puzzled even her love- 
blinded eyes about Oliver. He had the look, un- 
mistakable to anyone who has seen it once be- 
fore, of the man who has shaken his nerve with 
heavy drinking over night, and has “ pulled him- 
self together ” in the morning with some diffi- 
culty. To Hetty it seemed as if he were ill, or 
affected strangely by some trouble that weighed 
upon his mind. Margery, however, was not at all 
deceived, and her disgust deepened momently. And 
this disgust produced a curious result; her own 
natural strength partly returned to her, and her fear 
of him died away. She raised her eyes at last and 
looked him full in the face, and when her eyes 
met his, his fell first. What elasticity and hope 
came to her as she realized this ! It was a joy 
like that of one who might hope to be born 
again. 

But this only lasted a little while, for Oliver 


246 


SUGGESTION. 


was rapidly becoming more himself with the 
healthful effects of the ride and the fresh air, and 
the sense of the necessity for action. He saw 
that Margery was escaping from him, and he 
cursed himself for haying destroyed his power so 
foolishly. 

He resolved in future to bear the pangs of 
conscience rather than take an oblivion which cost 
so dear. Resolutions of this kind are usually 
registered with great fervor ; but the cause which 
destroys the original rectitude is powerful enough 
to destroy the repentant one. This is a fact which 
was as yet unknown to Oliver, and had to be as- 
certained by experience. At the moment he felt 
capable of bringing back all his original manhood 
and its power. 

The gong sounded for lunch, and the three went 
into the house together. Sir Charles and Rex 
were in the dining-room. The meeting between 
the brothers was extremely cold, and the situation 
threatened to be very embarrassing, and would 
have been so but for Sir Charles, who came to the 
rescue with a, flood, of cheerful small-talk. He 


SUGGESTION. 


247 


and Hetty were great friends, and they managed 
to keep the ball going. She did her best, and was 
delightful. Nevertheless she was very uneasy, for 
she became more and more definitely conscious 
that there was something wrong. Rex was the 
only one who actually made no effort to appear at 
ease. He sat gloomily at the table, but eat noth- 
ing. Oliver, on the contrary, simulated his natural 
manner with great success. His whole attention 
was in reality given to recovering his power over 
Margery; and he thought little and cared less 
about the way his brother received him, or whether 
he was welcome in the house or no. 

Immediately lunch was over Rex left the 
others and disappeared. Margery went into the 
library, where a large fire was burning, and sat 
down in a low chair beside it. She scarcely no- 
ticed whether the others followed her. A deep 
stupor was settling in upon her, which she strug- 
gled against in vain. She felt it was Oliver’s 
presence which caused it, and she would have 
given worlds to have had the courage and resolu- 
tion to tell him to leave the house. But during 


248 


SUGGESTION . 


lunch, while she had sat opposite him, his eyes 
upon her, all her courage and resolution had faded. 
His supremacy was complete for the moment, and 
it was as useless for her to make any effort against 
it as it is useless to struggle in the horrors of a 
nightmare. 

She did not hear or notice what was said, or 
what was going on around her, though the others 
had all followed her and grouped themselves about 
the fire. They formed a very merry party, too ; 
whether the gayety was natural or imposed, never- 
theless it was there. And yet everyone was full 
of a strange uneasiness which each fancied was all 
his or her own. Oliver’s aim was by some means 
or other to get Margery alone, and he was deter- 
mined not to leave her till he had done so, and 
had made the impression on her mind that he 
intended to make. 

For now, in his present phase of feeling, all 
remorse was gone from him, and he was conscious 
of nothing hut his hatred of Rex, and his resolution 
to stand in his shoes. Sitting at the lunch-table 
with him, had excited and intensified these feelings 


SUGGESTION. 


249 


to the last degree. If Rex had found it possible 
to address a friendly word to him, or, still more, to 
hold out the least hope of help, this hatred between 
them would never have reached so awful a pitch. 
But Rex was smarting and suffering under a non- 
existent wrong, and his sense of injury made the 
situation hopeless and horrible. 

Here in the old house, Oliver felt he ought to 
be at home ; he looked on Rex as an absolute 
usurper because he had all. What was easier than 
to get him out of the way ? Everything was left 
to Margery ; with his power over her it would be 
very easy to make her marry him. Whether she 
liked or loathed him mattered nothing to him, so 
long as she enabled him to step into Rex’s shoes. 
And he thought it over coolly, and decided on hie 
course of action even while he talked to Hetty, 
and met her lovely eyes with the love in them 
very ill concealed. For Hetty was too frank to be 
able to hide anything, and Oliver knew that she 
was his for the asking. But to him she only 
amounted to a second string to his bow. He 
devoted himself to keeping her in her present state 


250 


SUGGESTION . 


of mind, as he thought she might be worth fighting 
for if be failed in his great plan. 

But he had no intention of failing in it. He 
was in the confident humor, when all things are 
not only possible but certain. 

About four o’clock some visitors arrived ; Mr. 
and Mrs. Carruthers. 

Margery dully and absently responded to Mrs. 
Carruthers’ affectionate and anxious inquiries 
about her. She had all the appearance and manner 
of one who is really ill, so that both she and 
Oliver felt that the strange secret which existed 
between them was perfectly safe. 

Mr. Carruthers was a tall, dark, severe-looking 
man, with the most perfect manners, and only a 
faint reminder of the Yankee quaintness of speech 
and tone which was so marked in Hetty. It was 
hard to believe him to be her brother, they were 
so different in appearance, until one came to talk 
to him, and know him. Then the same generous 
nature and honest spirit made themselves felt. 
Business and its associations had dried out of him 
the fresh raciness which made Hetty so charm- 


SUGGESTION. 


251 


ing ; but underneath, the nature was the same. 
Margery felt this instinctively. She liked him at 
once, and found it pleasant to talk to him even in 
her dulled and abnormal state. His pride and 
delight in his beautiful young wife made itself 
visible immediately ; he could not hide his strong 
feelings any more than could Hetty. These two 
were both born to love and worship and to suffer 
everything from those they loved and worshipped. 

Fortunately for Joseph Carruthers he had chosen 
a woman who looked upon life as an art and who 
certainly would not make him suffer if she could 
possibly avoid it, for suffering appeared to her to 
be unsesthetic. 

The Carruthers stayed about an hour, and when 
they went carried Hetty off with them. She would 
have been left with Margery if Oliver had not been 
there, but the Carruthers were much too well aware 
of the state of her feelings to leave her, under the 
circumstances. Oliver gave a sigh of relief when 
they had gone. He looked at Sir Charles thought- 
fully, considering how to get rid of him. 

A silence came upon the little company, for 


252 


SUGGESTION. 


Sir Charles was still too angry with Oliver to speak 
civilly to him, except under social pressure ; and 
Margery felt it no longer necessary to exert herself. 
It was a sort of luxury to yield herself up to the 
stupor which hung over her, after fighting it for 
so long. 

Oliver planted himself in front of the fire and 
showed no intention of moving. He considered 
himself to be, at all events, more at home than Sir 
Charles was, and he determined to stay him out. 
That was his only course. He thought it might 
serve, as he did not believe that Rex would come 
into the room while he was there. 

So it turned out : Sir Charles, annoyed by his 
persistency, went off in rather a bad temper. 

Oliver immediately turned to Margery. She 
was already so much under his influence as to be 
almost asleep, and it was only neccessary for him 
to raise his hand and look into her eyes to make 
her pass into the deepest hypnotic trance. 

“ Do you understand ? ” he said, “ you have to 
kill him.” 

“ I will not,” she said, in a strange, sharp tone. 


SUGGESTION. 


253 


“ You will ! ” he commanded, and repeated it 
several times. 

“ I cannot ! ” she said in the same tone, but more 
faintly. 

“ You can ! ” 

Her head fell on one side ; she seemed to be 
dead, so deep was the stupor he had flung her into. 

“ Go up to his dressing-room,” he said, “ and 
change the position of the two little blue bottles 
which stand just inside the door of the bureau. 
Do you understand ? Do you know them ? ” 

“ No.” 

“ Do you see them now ? ” 

“No.” 

“ You can now ? You see the bureau ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Tell me if they are there. They always used 
to be.” 

“ Yes, they are there.” 

“ Go up, the moment you wake, and change their 
places. Put the one that is to the right to the left, 
and vice versd. Do you understand ? ” 


“Yes.” 


254 


SUGGESTION. 


“ Obey me, then. Wake ! ” 

She was in so deep a trance that it seemed as if 
he would never wake her. At last, however, she 
was sufficiently roused to he able to move, and then 
immediately got up from her chair and left the 
room. Oliver watched her go, and went into the 
hall to see her pass up the stairs. Then he turned 
into the dining-room, which was empty, but very 
pleasant and cheerful, with a bright fire, the table 
laid ready for dinner and decorated with flowers. 
He went to the sideboard, and took out a decanter. 
He went over to the fire and stood by it, putting 
the decanter on the mantelpiece and continually 
filling a wineglass he held. His mind was in such 
a fearful state that he had lost the ordinary use of 
his senses, and positively did not know he was 
drinking raw brandy. 


SUGGESTION. 


255 


CHAPTER XX. 

It was about half-past six when Rex came out 
of his study, where he had shut himself up all the 
afternoon, and went up to his dressing-room.. 

It was one of his customs to be very punctual 
in dressing for dinner, as he always took a dose of 
medicine before it. Ever since his stay in Cali- 
fornia this had become a habit, as a slight fever he 
had contracted there occasionally returned upon 
him unless he took these precautions. 

To-day he walked upstairs with his eyes upon 
the ground, and his hands in his pockets, in the 
attitude peculiar to an Englishman when despond- 
ent. Life seemed very dark, very hopeless to 
him. 

How strange fortune is ! A young man with 
every personal attribute necessary to make him 
liked, with abundant fortune, and all the world 


256 


SUGGESTION. 


before him, he felt like a criminal at the stake, 
without hope. 

He had never loved any woman but Margery. 
He was one of those men who love but once and 
love completely. To lose her meant losing all that 
he understood as life or happiness. Money and 
position were nothing without her. And the pe- 
culiar, intense sting always burned within him, 
that it would have been easier to lose her to any 
other man than the one who had stolen her. 

His head drooped, he walked slowly to his room, 
carrying out his mechanical habits without taking 
any interest in them ; his mind all the while set 
on the darkness which lay before him. 

He went into his dressing-room, closed the door, 
and then, walking to the window, stood looking 
out of it a little while. ' He gazed at the familiar 
trees, and the lines of the park as they melted away 
in the twilight, seeing them as old friends, which in 
some faint way soothed the turmoil of his mind. 
Here at least there was no change ; while he lived 
the trees and the park would all remain as they 
were. They could not deceive or betray him. 


SUGGESTION. 


257 


Presently he turned and crossed the room to his 
bureau. Inside the upper door was a little ledge 
on which stood a medicine case, with a little blue 
bottle on each side of it. He took up the left one, 
poured out a dose and raised it to his lips. Before 
his lips touched it he was stupefied with amaze- 
ment ; two warm, soft arms were round his neck. 
He had not heard a sound, and he could scarcely 
believe his senses. The gas was burning low ; he 
put out his hand and turned it up full, setting 
down the glass untasted in order to do this. 

Margery was clinging to him like some desperate 
creature, her face hidden, her arms locked round 
him. He looked down at her in amazement. What 
did this mean? He tried to unclasp her hands, but 
in vain. For some minutes they stood like this, two 
hearts beating in agony, and without any intelli- 
gence, one of the other. 

At last she lifted her head ' slowly and showed 
her face. He saw a face that he had never seen 
before ; it seemed like that of a stranger, so drawn 
and white, and agony-stamped was it. 

17 


258 


SUGGESTION. 


“ You have not drank it?” she said in a whis- 
per. 

“ Drank what ? The medicine ? — No, I’m just 
going to take it.” 

“ No — don’t touch it. Come away with me out 
of this room. Come — please — -yes, I insist! I 
shall die here. O what I have suffered ! ” 

She dragged him to the door, he so utterly per- 
plexed that he knew not whether to resist her or 
obey. He yielded, however, for she seemed fran- 
tic with anxiety to get out of the room. She held 
fast to him till they were outside the door, which 
she shut tight behind her. 

“ My God ! ” she exclaimed ; “ what a night- 
mare I have lived through ! What a horror ! But 
it’s over for some strange reason. Come with me, 
Rex ; I must find Oliver.” 

He followed her, perfectly puzzled, but saying 
nothing, for it seemed useless to ask her questions, 
in her excited, unnatural state. And yet, un- 
natural as her excitement was, there was something 
more like the old Margery about her ; and a faint 
wild hope rose in his heart. 


SUGGESTION. 


259 


They went downstairs, Margery leading the way. 
She went into the library, looked round, and came 
out again ; then into the drawing-room. From 
there she came out again into the hall, and met the 
butler, who, when he saw her, turned back to shut 
the dining-room door. 

“ Do you know where Mr. Oliver is ? ” she said. 

“ No, ma’am, I don’t,” he answered, and looked 
at Rex with a very odd expression. He remained 
standing by the door he had shut. 

“He’s in there,” said Margery suddenly; and 
pushing past the man she opened the door and 
went in. 

Oliver sat in a chair by the fire, a straight dining- 
room chair. His head was propped against the 
mantelpiece for he was quite unable to hold it up. 

“ Bring her away, sir, please,” said the servant 
to Rex. “ Mr. Oliver has had a drop too much, 
and he wouldn’t like to be seen in such a state.” 

“ Come away, Margery,” said Rex. 

But instead of obeying him she walked straight 
up to Oliver and stood looking at him. Her figure 
seemed taller, her air more confident, than it had 


260 


SUGGESTION. 


ever been. The distress was vanishing from her 
face, and triumph took its place by degrees. She 
would not move, though Rex came and tried to 
lead her away. 

“ No,” she said. “ I want to talk to you here, 
and now. I want to tell you a story. Have 
patience and listen to me. This man, who has 
tried to curse my life and make of me a criminal, 
and who very nearly succeeded ! — Yes, very nearly 
succeeded. This man is helpless now and idiotic 
from his own folly, and I will use the opportunity. 
I am myself, now that he is a beast ; let me speak 
while I have the power, and then you will know 
all, and be able to save me. Oh, Rex, it is an evil 
conscience that has driven him to this ! ” 

Rex had sent the servant away when she began 
to speak, and shut the door. They were alone. 
Standing in front of Oliver, looking down upon 
him, her hands clasped tight, as if to hold her ex- 
citement in check, Margery began at the beginning 
and told him all the story that has been related 
here, so far as she understood it and could tell it. 

Rex listened, in momently deepening amazement, 


SUGGESTION. 


261 


sometimes incredulous, actually not believing wliat 
she said. 

“ I will give you my diary to read,” she said at 
last. “ It is upstairs in my room ; come with me 
and leave this creature for the servants to take 
care of.” 

She led the way again, and he followed her, so 
perplexed as to have no word to say. In the hall 
they found Sir Charles and the butler hovering 
about. 

“ What’s wrong ? ” said Sir Charles. “ Is it 
Oliver?” 

“Yes,” said Rex, seizing the opportunity of 
getting rid of him. “ Do go and see what’s to be 
done. Perhaps the servants can get him up to his 
old room, and we’ll let him sleep it off there. 
Margery wants me.” 

Margery had gone on upstairs, and Rex, having 
said this, hastily followed her. 

“ Is it possible,” he exclaimed, directly he 
entered the room, “ that all this misery has risen 
out of your jealousy of Mrs. Carruthers ! It doesn’t 
seem credible ! Great Heavens ! The mystery 


262 


SUGGESTION. 


between us was nothing but this : I had seen her 
in California, when she served drinks in a mining 
saloon. She is the daughter of a convict. How 
she got where she is I can’t imagine, but she always 
said it was by fair means, and begged me not to 
let people know what she had been.” 

“ But she had a hold over you,” said Margery 
in a very low voice. 

64 Oh, that ! ” answered Rex uneasily. “Well, I 
had better explain everything, as this is a day of 
explanations. I never wanted you to know it, for 
I don’t like thinking about it myself. There was a 
row in the saloon she served in, one night, and I 
shot a man — a man I liked too ! But he was mad 
with drink, and I had to do it, or die myself. She 
knew very well I’m not the sort to like the incident 
talked about at home here, where we’re not ac- 
customed to free fights. I'd almost succeeded 
in forgetting it, till she revived the unpleasant 
memory.” 


SUGGESTION. 


263 


CHAPTER XXI. 

Frightened at his own thoughts, Oliver had 
been drowning them steadily all the afternoon, 
till he had finally drowned his intelligence alto- 
gether. The effects of the last few days were on 
him still, and as a matter of fact the hour or two 
in which he had recovered his influence over Mar- 
gery were only a rift in the cloud. She was cer- 
tain of her deliverance if she could only have 
known it. The agonies of conscience which he 
suffered made life unendurable to him unless he 
deadened them; the horrible idea of the future 
punishment which he firmly believed he was lay- 
ing up for himself, came like the sharp sting of a 
physical pain the moment the necessity for action 
ceased. Then he must deaden his terror, and took 
any possible mode of doing so. He had adopted 
a very simple mode of effecting what he wanted, 
and had done it in such a manner that he did not 


264 


SUGGESTION. 


believe any person could ever be blamed for it. 
Rex Heriot would be dead from a purely accident- 
al cause, having taken a dose of carbolic acid by 
mistake for his usual medicine. How simple and 
easy it was ! If it should fail, if Margery should 
have fallen into the hypnotic sleep again, and not 
carried out her orders, or if she should struggle 
against them and delay, he felt quite safe, because 
he was convinced his power over her was strong 
enough to keep her under his control, and prevent 
her speaking to anyone but himself. He had been 
so successful in keeping her under control hitherto 
that he never doubted his power for a moment ; 
and went on pouring brandy down his throat to 
keep up his courage and keep off the horrors, for- 
getting, or never guessing, that he was destroying 
his will power absolutely. As his courage in- 
creased, his confidence of success became greater, 
until at last he began to listen every moment for 
the alarm through the house which would mean 
that Rex had drunk the fatal draught. Each 
time he thought of this the first feeling was exult- 
ation, and he told himself how he would step into 


SUGGESTION. 


265 


his brother’s shoes and have his turn at the good 
things of earth. But each time this exultation 
was followed by a fit of horror, and he went again 
to the only remedy he knew of. Thus, by the time 
Margery came into the room he was in a state of 
quarrelsome stupor, and only demanded fiercely to 
be let alone when anyone wished him to move. He 
stared stupidly at her in a senseless amazement, 
while she talked to Rex. Right in Oliver’s pres- 
ence she told everything, and he had so destroyed 
his brains that he had not the power to interfere. 
But it slowly entered his dulled mind that this had 
happened ; and when Sir Charles came into the 
room he was just struggling to his feet. 

44 I’ll go,” he was saying thickly ; 44 she’s played 
the devil with me. I’ll go.” 

His efforts were rather unsuccessful ; but still 
he managed to get out of the room. Sir Charles 
stood by and let him pass. 

44 What will he do ? ” he said to the old butler. 
44 He oughtn’t to go out alone.” 

44 He’s so mad with me already, Sir Charles, for 
trying to get him out of here before Mrs. Rex 


266 


SUGGESTION. 


came down, that I daren’t interfere any more.” 

“ Where is Rex ? ” said Sir Charles. “ I’ll get 
him to come. I can’t take the responsibility.” 

Sir Charles went upstairs and summoned Rex, 
who came out to him, with a very white face full 
of emotion. Sir Charles could hear Margery sob- 
bing. She had broken down at last. 

“We can do nothing with Oliver,” said Sir 
Charles. — “ Hark, he has gone out of the house. 
He’s not fit to be about alone ; besides it’s a dis- 
grace, and the servants are afraid of him. Come 
with me.” 

“ Stay with Margery,” said Rex, a sudden fierce 
sternness coming into his face. He went quickly 
downstairs, and out at the door. 

Oliver had gone across to the stables, with stag- 
gering strides. It was easy for Rex to pick him 
up. He did so, passed him, turned and looked at 
him and then went into the harness-room. Oliver 
called to a groom to bring him his horse ; and 
then followed Rex to the door of the harness-room. 
Here, where the happiest days of their boyhood 
had been spent, the two stood, face to face. Rex 


SUGGESTION. 


267 


had taken down a horsewhip and was coming to 
the door as Oliver entered. The two faces were 
terrible from the hatred that was in them both ; 
but Oliver’s was disfigured and brutalized by the 
condition he was in. Rex raised the whip for a 
second and felt all the hungry fury of longing 
to lash this detestable image of himself into 
shame ; but the expression of the face before him 
filled him with contempt too great for even such 
a deed. 

“ I’ll wait,” he said, throwing the whip down, 
“ till you’re sober and can understand the lesson 
I mean to give you.” 

“ Yes, wait,” sneered Oliver, “ that’s all you’re 
good for. It is like a coward to threaten and 
draw back.” 

His horse was brought into the yard at that 
moment and he stepped back through the door- 
way. He had just sense enough to know that he 
was in no condition to meet a man of his own 
strength. Mad as he was, he was not mad enough 
for that. But he had said too much, in his rage. 
Rex stooped, picked up the horsewhip and in an 


268 


SUGGESTION. 


instant had caught him by the collar and was 
dealing him blow after blow. Instantly, and as if 
by magic, the yard was full of men, gazing at the 
horrible scene. It only lasted a minute. Oliver 
wrenched himself free, flung Rex back with all his 
force and sprang on to his horse. He was spurred, 
and he dug the spurs into the animal’s sides so that 
it sprang forward and scattered the servants right 
and left. A moment later and it could be heard 
thundering down the avenue like a creature pos- 
sessed. 

Rex walked across the yard to the house silent, 
white, looking very strange. The men kept back 
from him and went away whispering together. 
On the steps of the house Rex found Sir Charles. 

44 He’s on Black Bess,” Sir Charles exclaimed, 
the moment he caught sight of him. “ He’ll lame 
her as he lamed Graybeard. It’s cruel work. 
What made you let him go ? ” 

Rex walked into the house without answering. 
Margery was standing in the hall, white and 
trembling. 

44 Rex ! what has happened ? ” she exclaimed. 


SUGGESTION. 


269 


u Why do you look like that ? What have you 
done to him ? ” 

“ Lashed him like the hound he is,” answered 
Rex, “ or rather, as we beat the dogs that are 
twenty thousand times as good as such men.” 

Sir Charles had come into the ball, and at this 
he uttered an exclamation of amazement. So 
far no confidence had passed beyond Rex and 
Margery. 

“ What does he mean ? ” said Sir Charles to his 
daughter. 

“ I don’t know, father,” she said. “ Don’t ask 
— let it be. They have quarrelled terribly, that is 
all.” 

“ Shall I go home now, Madge ? ” said Sir 
Charles, “ or would you rather I stayed with you ? ” 

“ I think you’d like to go, wouldn’t you ? ” she 
said. 

“Only because of Black Bess. I know he’ll 
ill-use her. But we can send a groom to see to 
that if you want me.” 

“ No,” she said, “ I will goto Rex. He has shut 
himself in the study, but I will get him to let me 


270 


SUGGESTION. 


in. You go, papa ; I know you are anxious to get 
home. Come as soon as you can.” 

Sir Charles was soon gone, for his heart was at 
the moment with his favorite mare. 


SUGGESTION. 


271 


CHAPTER XXII. 

An hour later and Heriot Hall was roused from 
a deep silence into which it had fallen by a tremen- 
dous knocking at the front door. There had been 
no dinner, and the servants had given up all hopes 
of there being any. There was the peculiar atmos- 
phere in the house which is produced by sickness or 
acute trouble. The servants were all together in 
the housekeeper’s room, talking over the different 
scenes of the day in low voices. Rex and Margery 
were still shut in the study. There was scarcely 
a sound in the house. Upon this silence the loud 
knocking fell with the most startling effect. The 
impression of some fresh misfortune was produced 
by it instantly. 

Rex came out of the study just as the hall door 
was opened, and saw Sir Charles standing on the 
doorstep. One glance at him was enough to show 
that something had happened. 


m 


SUGGESTION. 


“What is it ? ” said Rex. 

“ Dead,” said Sir Charles, “ both dead.” 

“Who? what?” exclaimed Rex. 

“ Horse and man both — Oliver and Black Bess. 
He must have been possessed by a devil ! Tell the 
men to come with lights and carry him to the 
house.” 

By the time they reached the spot — a dark place 
in a lane, where there was a sudden and very steep 
hill — there were a number of people there, carrying 
lanterns and torches. The news spread abroad like 
wildfire, and the village turned out in a body to 
see if it was true. True indeed ; poor Black Bess, 
a shapeless mass at the bottom of the hill, and 
Oliver crushed beneath her. 

A dark, solemn procession came up the hill some 
time later, with Oliver’s body in its midst, laid on 
an improvised stretcher. Sir Charles lingered be- 
hind to see the body of the poor mare laid decently, 
and arranged for its burial on the morrow, then 
walked up to the Hall alone, in the dark, thinking 
very seriously. 

“No doubt it’s best ! ” he said to himself, “ no 


SUGGESTION. 273 

doubt it’s best. I was fond of the boy, and I shall 
miss him ; but he was going to the bad too fast. 
It’s long since he had an hour of happiness, and it’s 
long before he would have had one. And he’s 
brought trouble to my Madge ; that I’m sure of. 
For her sake he’s well out of the way.” 

And Sir Charles was perhaps the best friend 
Oliver had in the world ! 

How little we guess how little we are missed. 

But there was one heart yet to suffer ; and 
strangely enough it was one that Oliver valued 
not at all. 

Mr. Carruthers came to the Hall later in the 
evening to know if what he had heard was true. 
Oliver’s body lay in the dining-room, and was 
sufficient answer in itself. He went quickly home 
again, after a few words with Rex and Sir Charles. 

Hetty was waiting for him, all the lovely color 
gone from her face, and a wild agony in her 
beautiful blue eyes. 

“ It’s true, Hetty,” said her brother. 

“ Oh, how am I to bear it ! ” she exclaimed. 

18 


274 


SUGGESTION. 


Extract from Mrs. Rex Heriot’s Diary. 

“ I hope this is the last entry I shall ever make 
in this terrible little hook ! It holds the history of 
a horror ; and surely I have suffered enough in the 
course of that history, and shall not be condemned 
by fate to bear more of the same kind ! Nothing 
else could stand beside it or be written of in the 
same pages. No every-day troubles or any trials 
of ordinary life could be thought of at the same 
time as this experience. 

“ To think of that poor soul gone straight into 
Eternity in the midst of his sin ! 

“ The one thought with all of us is Hetty. I 
think now that she will live, but for a long time 
we feared she would not. A little color is coming 
back to the pale face now, a little life into the sad 
eyes. 

“ W e have all agreed to tell her nothing more of 
Oliver’s real character and history than she already 
knew. It is better and much happier for her only 
to mourn him as one dead, not to have to see her 


SUGGESTION. 


275 


idol shattered and broken to pieces before her 
eyes. I am glad, very glad, for her sake that she 
never knew him to be what he was. She will 
always think of him tenderly instead of with 
horror. 

“ I cannot yet quite shake off the horror. I think 
it will be more or less with me all my life. 

“ In those awful hours I passed in Rex’s dressing- 
room, I saw the deed done over and over again, so 
plainly that I suffered all the agony of its actually 
being done. Oh, Rex, I never knew till then how 
I loved you ! And in that dark hour 1 learned 
what it is to kill the thing one loves, to add the 
agony of grief to the remorse for sin. I do not 
know how I kept my sanity. Even now I con- 
stantly wake shuddering and trembling at night, 
thinking it is all true and no mere dream of 
horror, as it mercifully was. 

“ But how nearly it was true ! If remorse had 
not driven him to drink and broken his will it 
would have been true. Oh, how horrible ! 

“ I can sit and ponder for hours at a time trying 
to disentangle the mystery of the thing. Whose 


276 


SUGGESTION. 


was the guilt ? Whose would have been the 
guilt ? — his or mine ? I who did the deeds or he 
who suggested them? Alas ! I think he knew the 
guilt was his, or he would not have died that 
awful death.” 


THE END. 




















































































































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was evidently inspired by the prevailing theosophical mania. It 
has enough and to spare of mystery and horror, of magic, of starry 
spirits, visions and airy elements ; but it is not without a certain 
power in conception and skill in treatment. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 

2. 2>reamg an& 2)ream Stories By Anna (Bonus) Kingsford 

The author, if the sources of these stories be exactly as set 
forth by her, certainly has a remarkable faculty for dreaming 
extraordinary things, of which not the least strange are the lucid 
stories that her sleep brings forth. Her book is peculiarly inter- 
esting reading. Although these narratives are not supposed to be 
conscious efforts of the imagination, there is no want of coherence 
in their action, nor is there any striking incongruity of detail. 
These tales are interesting to students of occultism and kindred 
subjects. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 

3, XTbe flMIgrim anfr tbe Sbtfne - By Edward Maitland 

“The Pilgrim and the Shrine,” by Edward Maitland, is a 
remarkable book giving the experience of one who breaks away 
from all received dogmas and accepts faith and finds a new religion 
in the idea that self-knowledge is the only true knowledge, and that 
the only sin against God is sin against ourselves. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 

V. /Iftagic— ' UJlbite attft ffilacfc - By Franz Hartmann, M.D. 

“Magic — White and Black,” by Franz Hartmann, M.D., is a 
recent issue in Lovell’s Occult Series^ The work is one in which 
deep thought and a wonderful insight into the intricate workings of 
human life is shown, and the lover of occult literature cannot fail to 
find here topics of absorbing interest, while every thinking man 
must see the sound reasoning of a brilliant mind. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 


LOVELL, GESTEFELD & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, N. Y. 


LOVELL’S OCCULT SERIES. 


5, XLhc perfect mag 

By Edward Maitland and Anna (Bonus) Kingsford 

It is based on the fact that the faith of Christendom is lan- 
guishing on account of a radical defect in the method of its presen- 
tation, through which it is brought into perpetual conflict with 
science, the author’s endeavor being to harmonize the two by placing 
the plane of religious belief, not where the Church has hitherto 
placed it, but in man’s own mind and heart. 

The manner of presentation is interesting, and the construction 
convincing. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 

6» TReincarnation - * - By e. d. Walker 

“Reincarnation,” by the late E. D. Walker, is an exhaustive 
treatise on the subject, tracing and quoting authorities in a com- 
prehensive and lucid manner at once interesting and free from any 
detail and tiresome quotations in the text. An appendix carefully 
prepared, gives reference to similar works in other languages, and 
the work is also carefully indexed. This edition is printed from 
plates which were revised and corrected at the author’s solicitation 
but a few days before his unfortunate death. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 

7» ir&gii of t be mm c xotug By Mabel Collins 

and Epitome of Theosophical Teachings and Esoteric 
Theosophy. 

“ The Idyll of the White Lotus,” which has been so popular in 
both England and America in expensive binding, has been issued in 
this series, together with an Epitome of Theosophical Teachings by 
Wm. Q. Judge. “The Idyll of the White Lotus ” is a prose poem 
of wonderful strength, breathing an atmosphere of sublime philoso- 
phy at once entertaining, instructive and elevating. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, SO CENTS 


LOVELL, GESTEFELD & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, N. Y. 


LOVELL’S OCCULT SERIES. 


8> Tfleila Sen an& flftp Casual Beatb - By j. h. Connelly 

The plot is ingeniously conceived and carefully worked out, 
the characters are all strongly drawn, but the affections of the 
readers are taken strong hold upon by the beautiful, pure-hearted, 
and delightfully unsophisticated heroine. It is a clever story, pure 
in tone and honest in purpose.—; Journalist. 

CLOTH, $I.OO. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 

9 , ciotbefr wftb tbe Sun - By Anna (Bonus) Kingsford 

An esoteric book of great value. Whoever is interested in 
occultism wants to have this volume in their library, and to give it 
the careful study that it deserves. Apart from the esoteric teach- 
ings, this book contains many passages of great beauty. — Tacoma 
Globe . 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, SO CENTS. 

10. jparacelgug (In Press) - By Franz Hartmann, M.D. 

The author’s name is a sufficient guaranty for the tenor of the 
book. — Brooklyn Union. 

Dr. Hartmann takes special pains to show that he attacks 
abuses and follies and not persons. — London Times. 

Theosophists are much troubled just now by a division in the 
camp which bids fair to play ‘old gooseberry* with Theosophy. 
Dr. Hartmann, a remarkably attractive writer and a man of no 
slight ability, is accused of poking fun at some prominent votaries. 
This is rather awkward, because many of the most prominent 
workers of the school almost detfy this same doctor.” — Daily 
Chronicle. 

An artist who protests against the abuses of his art, can certainly 
not be regarded as a traitor to his art. — Lucifer. 

He wants to give an impulse to the study of a science which he 
calls “the anatomy and physiology of the soul,” and which investi- 
gates the elements of which the soul is composed, and the source 
from which man’s emotions spring. — Book Chat. 

CLOTH, $1.00. PAPER, 50 CENTS. 


LOVELL, GESTEFELD & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, N. Y, 


BIOGRAPHIES 

OF 

CELEBRATED PERSONS 

PUBLISHED IN 

Lovell’s Literature Series. 


NO. TITLE AUTHOR PRICE 

170 Blaine Chas. W. Balestier 2® 

83 Bremer, Fredrica. .. .Charlotte Bremer. 25 

180 Bunyan J. A. Froude 10 

193 Burke John Morley 10 

197 Burns Principal Shairp 10 

82 Byron John Nichol 20 

186 Chaucer Prof. A. W. Ward 10 

202 Cleveland, Grover. . .Deshler Welch 25 

118 Columbus. Vol. I. . ..Washington Irving 30 

119 Columbus. Vol. II. .. .Washington Irving 30 

187 Cowper Gold win Smith io 

no Cromwell Paxton Hood 20 

160 Defoe Wm. Minto 10 

84 Gibbon J. C. Morrison 20 

191 Goldsmith Washington Irving 25 

61 Heine Thomas Carlyle 20 

157 Hume Professor Huxley 10 

166 Johnson Leslie Stephen 10 

195 Jones, Paul 25 

161 Locke F. Fowler 10 

136 Mahomet. Vol. I. .. .Washington Irving 25 

149 Mahomet. Vol. II. .. .Washington Irving 25 

106 Marion Horry and Weems 25 

163 Milton Mark Pattison 10 

165 Pope Leslie Stephen 10 

53 Schiller Thomas Carlyle 25 

184 Scott, Sir Walter. . . .R. H. Hutton 10 

183 Shelley Addington Symonds 10 

188 Spencer A. W. Church 10 

54 Sterling, John Thomas Carlyle 25 

169 Southey Professor Dowden ; IO 

80 Washington L. Henley 25 

122 Webster. Vol. I Smucker 25 

123 Webster. Vol. II Smucker 25 

189 Wordsworth Meyers 


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